


Who Knows How To Love You Without Being Told

by dolly_dagger87



Category: Band of Brothers, Generation Kill, The Pacific (TV)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-21
Updated: 2015-02-21
Packaged: 2018-03-14 11:04:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 29,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3408200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dolly_dagger87/pseuds/dolly_dagger87
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the age of sixteen, your soulmate’s name appears on your arm. At the age of sixteen, you can register your soulmates’ name in the government's search database, if your parents give you permission. At the age of sixteen, you might meet your soulmate. But what is absolutely certain is, at the age of sixteen, your life will change.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One

When he first met Lewis Nixon, it was an unremarkable day. Dick Winters had been in the middle of timed math test. Dick was very good at math. He was doing multiplication in second grade, a fact his mother was no small amount of pleased over, but Dick took it in stride. He’d been in the middle of his sixes, one minute, one hundred problems. The speed never bothered him, he got a single minded focus and just went. That day, when the class door opened, he hadn’t been able to find that zone again because on the other side of the room had been a boy. A beautiful boy. A boy with dark hair and dark eyes. He was unremarkable to everyone else but Dick.

When Dick had seen that boy, his world had stopped with so much force, Dick had felt it when it did. And maybe that boy’d felt it too, because his eyes had locked with Dick’s. They had a moment then even if no one else had noticed.

His teacher had called time and Dick hadn’t finished his test. He’d have to redo it the next day. Normally that would be frustrating, but not that day. That day all that Dick had cared about was the boy standing beside his teacher. The boy with messy dark hair had a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. His teacher had introduced him as Lewis Nixon. His desk ended up being pushed up to Dick’s group of four. Dick had smiled at him and introduced himself. His teacher seized on this and made the whole class introduce themselves. And were gifted with Lewis Nixon’s attention for only a moment before it returned to Dick Winters.

So what had started as an unremarkable day, was no longer that. It was now, and would forever be, in the mind of Dick Winters, the day he met his soulmate.

He didn’t tell Lew, or New as he would prefer in middle school, Dick only made the switch at school, that day. He would eventually, sitting in his treehouse at the tender age of twelve. But on that day, he’d kept it to himself. He’d grown up with soulmates being a feature of his day to day life. His parents were soulmates. His grandparents had been soulmates. It had never occurred to Dick that he would end up with anyone but his soulmate. When he was sixteen, a name would appear on his arm, the name of the person he was going to marry. And at that moment sitting in his desk in second grade, having just washed out on his sixes, he was sure that name was going to be Lewis Nixon.

But he kept that to himself, there was no need to make a fuss. He’d spent the rest of that day showing Lew the things every second grader needed to know. That if you reached back into the back of the milk cooler, you could get one that was slightly slushy. How to check out a library book. Which four square balls were flat and never quite aired up right. The best places in the room for silent reading.

Such a little leader, his teacher had said.

Dick just figured that’s just what you did when your soulmate was new at school.

When he got in the car that afternoon, his mother asked if he’d had a good day.

He told her yes.

She asked if anything exciting happened.

He told her he’d met his soulmate.

To her eternal credit, Edie Winters simply asked if it was one of the students still waiting with the teacher. Because Edie Winters had been in Dick’s shoes. When she was thirteen she had come home and told her mother that she was sure Richard Winters was her soulmate. Her mother hadn’t believed her. Her mother had told her it was a crush. But Edie had known, she had known in her bones that it wasn’t a crush. And she had promised herself, standing in her mother’s kitchen, made a promise if a child of hers ever told her they had met their soulmate she would believe them. She wouldn’t tell them it was a crush. She wouldn’t tell them they would understand when they were older. She would believe.

Dick told her, no, he rode the bus.

Edie nodded before informing her son that she wanted to meet this boy. That Dick should have him over. Because if Dick thought this boy was his soulmate, that was good enough for Edie.

Richard Winters didn’t take it as well. He laughed. Looking back he would say it was because he was surprised. When you ask your eight year old how school went, ‘good, I met my soulmate’ was not the response you expect. Got picked first for kickball, sure. But soulmates? Dick was eight. Richard Winters was not ready for that conversation. He sobered up quickly when Edie glared at him from the other end of the table. Dick was unfazed. To make up for his disbelief, Richard spent the rest of dinner asking questions. Even though Dick seemed enthralled, Richard had still chalked it up as his son finally finding a best friend.

It would pass. The soulmate thing, not the friendship.

That night, Dick Winters knelt at his bed like his mother had taught him to say his prayers. He asked God to bless and look out for his dad when he went to work at the electric company. To bless his mother, and the baby she was carrying, only a few months along. Normally then he would say amen, since asking for a blessing for himself seemed odd to Dick. And he knew his mother did it for him. But that night, for the first night, he asked for God to bless Lewis Nixon, his soulmate, and keep him safe.

That night Edie Winters made addition of her own. She asked God to protect and keep her boy and his boy, wherever he maybe.

Keep him safe.

Bless him and keep him.

Night after night, mother and son would repeat those words. They would say them after Lew’s first play day. After the first time he stayed the night. After the first time Dick found out where Lew’s bruises came from. After Edie first saw them, she would just know, the way a mother just knows.

Keep him safe.

Bless him and keep him.

*~*

Walt Hasser was ten when his parents moved to California. He didn’t want to move, but since it was for his dad’s job there wasn’t any room for discussion. So off he went, leaving Virginia in his rearview mirror. He’d miss his friends, but he thought that he could make new ones. His mother had told him at the time that it was what you did when you met your soulmate. You became a team and sometimes one person had to take it a hit for the good of the team. It was give and take and that was how you made it work.

When they got to California, the first person he met was their next door neighbor, Mrs. Colbert. As he got older, she would insist that he could call her Erica. But right then he was ten, so it was Mrs. Colbert. She brought, really dragged was a more appropriate word, her son Brad along with her. And that was how Walt met his first friend in California. How Brad had managed to make friends in the twelve years before Walt turned up was a mystery. Brad was, as Walt’s mother put it, difficult. Walt was of the opinion of why sugar coat it; Brad was an asshole. He was great once you got to know him, but that was a process and Walt could understand why so few people had gone through it.

They weren’t best friends, he and Brad, and that was ok. If they hadn’t lived next door to each other, they most likely would not have been friends. He and Brad were very different. Brad liked rock and roll. Guns and Roses, Metallica, and most importantly, Iron Maiden were all over Brad’s bedroom walls. Walt could tolerate metal, but it was not his favorite. Walt preferred country music. The good stuff, the classics, the golden era - Cash, Haggard, and Jennings. Brad loathed country music. Or as he called it, that whisky tango bullshit. So they mostly listened to metal because it wasn’t worth it to Walt. 

Another area where they could not be more different was the topic of soulmates. Walt’s parents believed in soulmates; they had always raised him that way. So he was looking forward to it, the moment he got the name on his arm. He could tell his mother was looking forward to it too. Walt wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Like now there might be some expectation. Would he live up to it when it arrived? But even with that nagging sense of dread, Walt was convinced that he would end up with that person when they arrived. Brad was indifferent at best. Soulmates where yet another thing that Brad lumped into the column of bullshit. Walt could tell that this didn’t sit well with Mrs. Colbert. So soulmates were another thing that Walt avoided talking about to keep the peace.

But they did live next door to each other so they were friends. No, Brad’s best friend was Robert Atkinson, and Walt tried not to take it personally when they went off surfing and he was not invited. He had his own friends and did not include Brad in everything he did. Besides, now that he knew how Brad and Robert were going to end up, well...in the end, Walt had nothing to worry about. By the time Walt turned sixteen, he’d been Brad’s best friend for two years.

Two years before when everything had gone to shit. And then Walt found two more subjects to add to the list of things not to mention to Brad. Three if you count the one on Brad’s arm. Walt tried not to even think about that one because it just pissed him off.

Walt couldn’t imagine just ignoring your soulmate, even if it wasn’t quite what you expected. They were your soulmate, damn it, and that meant something. Walt had no idea what to expect when he sat on the sofa on late Monday night. He had a girlfriend, Alison. She was very pretty and Walt liked the way she smelled. He was pretty sure you needed more than that to be soulmates. His mother was over the moon for her; she called her a darling girl. So Walt was not surprised when a J started to appear on his arm. It hurt that he knew he’d have to break it off with Alison, but it just wasn’t fair. His mother, on the other hand, seemed crushed, and excused herself to the kitchen. His dad sat with him until the whole name was visible, Josh Ray Person. His dad nodded and said the name was very southern. And wished Walt luck getting the boy to move this far west. After all, nothing short of a promotion had gotten Walt’s mother out here. He smiled at his dad. His mother returned from the kitchen to look at his arm. She smiled, told him it would take some getting used to, but she was sure he was lovely.

The next morning, the registration office couldn’t establish if he was lovely or not. Younger was what they could tell him. Walt wasn’t too surprised, he had a February birthday after all. He refused to believe his soulmate would just not give a shit, unlike someone he knew. His mother took him back to school in the afternoon and Alison took the news reasonably well. She did say they could try being friends and she didn’t hit him. So Walt counted it as a win.

That afternoon, he went over to the Colbert house when he saw Mrs. Colbert carrying in groceries. He’d started offering to help Mrs. Colbert when Brad stopped speaking to pretty much everyone. That was also the day Walt learned the Marines will not let you enlist if you are still color blind. Of course there was a simple solution to this, but since Walt liked having his head attached to his shoulders, he wasn’t going to mention it. After the groceries were in, Mrs. Colbert had asked about his name. He smiled and rolled up his sleeve and showed her the name. She read it aloud. Brad, who appeared out of nowhere, said it was the name of someone raised in a whiskey tango trailer park by a bow-legged female whose sole qualification for motherhood was a womb that happened to catch a sperm of a passing truck driver. Then he shoved him off the doorframe he was leaning on and left the room.

Walt called after him to shut the fuck up and heard Mrs. Colbert smother laughter while she put away her groceries. People who were leaving their soulmates for dead did not get to talk shit. He might have said that last part out loud, he was having a little trouble seeing through the blinding fury. Mrs. Colbert patted Walt’s shoulder and told him to bring Josh over when he came out to visit.

Walt told her he would. And he meant to. Because even if Nathaniel Fick meant nothing to Brad, Josh Ray Person meant something to Walt. 

*~*

Babe met Bill Guarnere when he was ten. His parents had gone out for a date and his mom had hired a friend’s son to watch them. Bill had just started driving and he convinced Babe’s mother he was responsible. Babe had spent the evening playing video games with Bill. It was nice, having an older brother in a way. It wasn’t that he didn’t like his older sister, it was just that she wasn’t often up for video games. Bill had just gotten his soulmate’s name the month before. He hadn’t meet Frances Peca yet, but he seemed convinced that she was the girl for him.

That didn’t surprise Babe. Most of the people in his church believed in soulmates. Most of them had married theirs and planned to encourage their children to do the same. Well, unless of course, the ones who turned up with names that belonged to someone of the same sex. When most people asked, they said they were a temptation; sent by who varied on who you asked. Some people said God. Some said the devil. No one said you were supposed to be in love with that person.

And this was a problem because it was also about this time that Babe had come to realize that he was not like the other boys. Looking back on it, Babe must have been around six when he first started to notice the signs. There was a picture book he’d gotten as a child about a pirate. The book told the story of the pirates’ adventures and Babe always wanted to run away with the pirate. His parents always said he had a sense of adventure. Now Babe knew that was not all it was. It would take some years before he’d realized what it was, but it was clearly more than that.

By the time he was twelve, he knew what it was. He knew he was gay and he knew that in four years that was going to be a problem. Babe was sure that on his sixteenth birthday, a boy’s name was going to appear on his arm. But he didn’t know what was going to happen. How would his parents react? He was not going away to some school. He was not going to turn his back on his soulmate. So what he was going to do, he didn’t know.

His search for what to do took a more tragic urgency the next year. There was a boy at his church. Babe didn’t know him well, but they were Sunday school friends. When Nick turned sixteen, a boy’s name came up on his arm. It was scandal at his church. All the parents were just crushed. Babe knew he was in trouble when his mom said she felt bad for ‘those poor parents’. In his panic, he turned to the one person he thought he could count on, Bill Guarnere.

It was Bill and Frannie now. They lived in their own apartment. Frannie was in nursing school and Bill worked on the waterfront as a clerk checking cargo. They were going to get married once Frannie graduated. Bill had always wanted a big family and because they are soulmates, Frannie seemed to as well. He had no idea what Bill was going to say, but he took the chance away. He went over to Bill’s house after Bill got off work. He confessed it all; he didn’t try to hide it or turn it into a hypothetical. Bill just nodded along as Babe spilled his guts. When Babe was finished, Bill sighed and told Babe there was probably nothing he could do but come live with them. Babe’s mouth dropped open and Bill assured him it would work out. And Babe must have not seem convinced because he went and got Frannie and spun out the whole thing for her. She hugged Babe told him of course he could stay with them. To prove their point, they went out the next weekend and bought a sleeper sofa.

The fact that he knew he at least had a place to live made it easier for Babe over the course of the next few years. As the days clicked by, the plan became more elaborate. Bill had a friend Joe Toye that got Frannie a fake ID so she could pretend to be Babe’s mom. With Babe’s real learner’s permit, they thought they could get him registered. They hoped that maybe after that, Babe could live with his soulmate. That way his parents couldn’t try to take him back. Bill also thought he could get Babe a job where he worked. It was rare for someone to start working that young but it wasn’t illegal. It was all very risky, but it was the best they could do. Even though it wasn’t much, it gave Babe hope.

So on the night of his birthday, the day after he got out of school for the summer, Babe sat in his room waiting for the name to come up. He’d gotten some things packed in a duffel and his backpack. He didn’t think he’d ever be able to come back here. His mom called him for dinner. He told her he’d be down in a minute. He ended up never going downstairs because as soon as he saw the name Eugene on his arm, he was out his window before he knew the guy’s last name. He got on a bus and headed for Bill and Frannie’s. When he got there, Frannie was taking a cake out of the oven. She hugged him again and he helped her make up the sofa. Bill got home and they grilled hamburgers. That night, Joe came over for beers and brought Frannie’s new ID.

The next morning, Babe and Frannie went down to the courthouse. The sign in process went smoothly. They hardly glanced at Frannie’s ID. They cleaned Babe’s arm and ran the ultraviolent. Babe passed, the name was real. Frannie fixed his hair before they took his picture. While they waited for the name to be run, Frannie told him about registering Bill’s name. That she’d gotten her hair and makeup done that morning. She’d wanted Bill to think she was pretty, Babe told her she hadn’t needed to worry. She smiled and told him she’d been so nervous. Her mom had told her to wait for Bill to call, that boys didn’t like forward girls. Babe laughed. Frannie had snuck out that night and called Bill on her cellphone. Babe knew the rest of the story and Frannie didn’t get a chance to tell it because the attendant came back.

She told him there wasn’t a Eugene Roe in their database. Frannie reassured him, told him not to worry. Babe didn’t, he never thought for a second that Gene wouldn’t turn up. He firmly believed that all he had to do was wait.

*~* 

Joseph Daniel Liebgott was born in the middle of the afternoon on a warm spring day in May. His mother missed Mothers’ Day that year by only a few days, but as she held her baby boy, it hadn’t occurred to her to mind. Since she was small, Mary had wanted to be a mother and now here he was, a darling baby boy. She would have five other children and she would love them all, but she would always have a soft spot for her oldest. She wanted the best for him and she tried to raise him right.

She took him to temple every Saturday and that produced mixed results. But he was good boy, so she overlooked it. She emphasized his school work and when it became clear he would not be going to college, she relented. He was smart, her boy, and he would work hard, so she had done her job. The one thing she refused to relent on was his soulmate. She was determined this would be the one tradition Joe wouldn’t avoid. If he fell madly in love with this person and married them, it was up to Joe. But he would meet this person, that Mary was firm about.

Joe had long since accepted that soulmates was a concept very important to his mother. His parents were soulmates. Both of his grandparents were. In fact, no one in Joe’s immediate family had married someone that wasn’t their soulmate. So he’d never considered not meeting his person. Mostly because he knew it would make his mother happy and he tried to do that as often as he could. She talked about soulmates to them all the time when they were younger. So to say that she made a big deal out of his sixteenth birthday was putting it mildly.

First, she kept him out of school that day. Joe was never allowed to skip school. If he didn’t have a fever or was throwing up, Mary packed his lunch and sent him to school. Mostly because if she’d given an inch, Joe would have taken the whole mile.

That morning they had gone to the DMV to get Joe’s provisional license. Joe had, of course, passed the driving test with flying colors. After driving around for fifty hours with his parents, he’d better have. Mary had to admit she was a little sad to see this day come. She’d be back to driving herself to the store, the bank, the hairdresser. For an entire year, all she had to say was ‘I’m going…’ and Joe would be standing at the door, keys ready to take her anywhere she wanted to go. She’d miss the time spent in the car with her son. But Joe had been adamant that getting a license was the most important thing that happened that day.

After that they went to see the Avengers again, but it was Joe’s birthday and it killed some time. And it gave Mary something to think about besides her son’s forearm. When the movie was over, she asked to see his arm. There, in neat block lettering, was the name ‘David Webster’. She smiled, it was a nice name. From the Bible, just like her Joe. She wanted to know everything about this boy; she wanted to begin the process of loving him like a son. Joe had told her it was just a name and tried to remove his arm from her rather tight grip.

After that, it was back to the Court House and in the basement they found the office of soulmate registration. For the second time that day, they sat in government issued chairs and waited for Joe’s name to be called. Once it was, he was lead back into a small exam room. Once there, his identity was confirmed using his shiny new driver’s license that Joe was all too happy to produce. Then contact information was established. The mark cleaned with alcohol and tested for variance using an ultraviolet light. Joe groaned and said if he were going to fake a name, he wouldn’t have chosen a name that sounded like a college professor with a stick up his ass. The attendant laughed, Mary did not. After that, Joe’s picture was taken. Mary had implored him to smile. After all, it would be the first photo David saw of him. Joe sighed a sigh that was reserved almost exclusively for his mother, but did it anyway. Well almost, Mary could tell it was forced, but she’d take what she could get.

Then they waited while the attendant stepped out to enter Joe into the database. Mary prayed, she wanted David to have an early birthday so he would already be in the system. She’d waited sixteen years for this, waiting seven more months might kill her. Joe sat on the exam table and read a comic. Like he couldn’t be less interested in what was going on the other side of the door. Mary wasn’t fooled, she noticed that every so often, Joe would sneak a glance at the door. When the attendant returned, it was bad news. David had yet to register the mark. Now it was Mary’s turn to sigh. Mary tried feel optimistic as the attendant explained that it was still early in the year. Mary nodded. All there was to do now was wait.

May turned into June. Joe spent most of the summer at the beach, dragging his best friend Bill with him. Or Hoosier as he’d been called since Joe had brought him over to her when she picked him up from preschool. She’d considered the possibility at the time that they fit together, but dismissed it because they were simply too alike. Her son could not have found a more loyal friend and she thanked God for that every day. Robert Leckie had better not abuse that loyalty or he’d have Mary to deal with. They returned one afternoon, their numbers doubled and Mary had tried not to be too disappointed when neither of the boys were named David. Charles Grant would have made any mother happy; he was a sincere and lovely boy. Burton Christenson’s mother was lucky woman. Floyd Talbert was charming, even if sometimes he did lay it on a little thick. Arlene Hunt would have her work cut out for her, but Mary figured she’d be lucky to meet the adult he’d grow into.

June slipped into July. And Tab’s family rented a house on the beach and so Mary packed her son off with him. And took comfort that Grant would be going too.

School started in August.

In September, summer ended and fall begin.

The boys went out for Halloween and were chased back to the Liebgott house by an angry neighbor with toilet paper in his trees.

November brought Thanksgiving.

December was marked with Hanukkah.

In January, Helen Smith had been her usual practical self. She swore in two years they’d feel silly that they had carried on worrying. Once they turned eighteen, their boys’ boys would turn up. Just wait.

Mary Liebgott had gone home that afternoon, sat at her kitchen table, and cried. The one thing she had wanted for her darling baby boy was for him to find someone that loved him like she did.

And now the one person capable of that was nowhere to be found.

*~*

George was seven years old when he met his best friend. Luz had spent the whole morning watching as the movers carried boxes into the house across the street. His mother had told him that they were going over there with cookies. So he’d sat and watched as the movers unloaded the boxes, trying to figure out if it was a family that had children. He was just starting to give up hope when he saw a boy about his age running out from behind the minivan in the driveway. Luz bolted from the living room into the kitchen to try and hurry his mother because they had to get over there now. It wasn’t that Luz didn’t have any friends. He had loads of friends; being funny will do that for you. But this one was right across the street! He could walk there. They could play at each other’s houses. Sleepovers were on the line and his mother was taking her dear sweet time on the presentation of the chocolate chip cookies. They were chocolate chip cookies, they did not need to be placed in the nice container in order to be pleasing.

So that was how George Luz met Carwood Lipton, standing next to his mother on Lip’s front porch. The rest was just as Luz had always planned. Every day after school they ended up at one house or the other. They had a sleepover nearly every weekend. They became inseparable, despite the fact that Lip was a year older than Luz. He just wished that Lip had moved for a happier reason. Losing his dad in car accident was something that Luz didn’t even want to think about.

Lip was everything Luz wanted in a best friend. He laughed at most of Luz’s jokes. He would let Luz repeat the lines of a movie, as long as he’d seen before. He would judge Luz’s impressions and help him make them better. He had nice toys, a large backyard, and his mother and younger brother were nice. As the friendship grew over the years, Luz learned Lip was fiercely loyal and unfailingly on the side of his friends.

It was this loyalty that made Lip very invested on one day finding his soulmate. Lip’s parents hadn’t been soulmates. In fact when Luz was eleven, he noticed that the name on Lip’s mom’s arm was girl’s name. When he’d asked his mom about it, she’d told him that it was a different time and not everyone was so open minded.

Luz had been facing that dilemma for a while himself. He knew pretty flatly that he wasn’t into girls. He’d thought he might be but then he’d tried to kiss a girl in second grade. Long story short, she’d taken a swing at him. He remembered at the time being more relieved than disappointed.

When he was eleven, Lip told Luz that he was gay. Luz was surprised this was something that Lip had felt he needed to sit down and have a serious conversation about. But then he remembered what his mom said. So he clapped Lip on the back and asked who the lucky boy was. Lip shoved him and Luz figured that they were alright.

It was then that Luz started to wonder if maybe that was his problem. Maybe he was gay? That did help a little bit, the idea of kissing a guy did seem more appealing than kissing a girl. Well, as long as the guy wasn’t Lip because…well, just no. So that was it, he was gay.

There was just one problem. Once Luz started trying to wrap his head around everything else you were supposed to do with a boy, Luz’s interest started to drop off really fast. By the time he’d turned fourteen, he’d gotten his hands on porn, thanks to an older cousin. So watching it was one thing. It actually wasn’t too bad and he did get turned on. The problem was that Luz didn’t really have any interest in doing that to someone else. Or having it done to him. This caused Luz a lot of anxiety, because there must be something seriously wrong with him. What kind of kid didn’t want to have sex?

So Luz did what he always did, he Googled.

And that’s where he found his answer after wading through some truly mortifying erectile dysfunction ads. After reading several pages about asexuality, Luz felt like he could breathe again. There wasn’t anything wrong with him. Turns out there was a world of people out there just like him. Well not just like him, there was a somewhat complicated spectrum to figure out. So after translating that into English, he figured out that he was decidedly a gay asexual. And that felt good. Having a label, having a box that you felt like you fit in. Just like all of your friends.

Lip took this, like he did everything, in stride. He read the description that Luz had provided and then agreed that yeah, that sounded like Luz. And Luz was relieved about this because whatever happened with his parents, at least he had Lip.

His parents had always been supportive. When he’d told them he was gay, they had been very supportive. They hadn’t joined P-flag or anything, but his mom had started berating her friends on Facebook. It had felt good to know that his parents were in his corner. Even if his mother did remind him that this wasn’t getting him out of giving her grandkids. He and his partner would just have to adopt children.

Telling them he was ace seemed harder. One because he sort of had to take back the first one. Well not really take it back, but amend it in obvious ways. Also complicating the whole thing was Lip’s sixteenth birthday.

Lip’s mother had always been very clear that she did not believe in soulmates and that she would not be giving him permission to register his name early. Lip, on the other hand, was pretty committed to the idea. And that freaked Luz out. What if Lip got his name? Stranger things had happened. Sometimes soulmates were a year older or a year younger. It could happen and the very idea made Luz want to cry. Lip deserved a soulmate that wanted to have sex with him, because even though Lip didn’t talk about it, Luz knew he wanted to have it. And Luz very much did not. So that was a problem. And Luz knew that Lip would compromise for him. And Luz hated that.

Luz’s mother, who was not aware of the emotional turmoil her son was going though, thought it would be sweet to invite Lip over for brunch. So someone could make a fuss about his name when it appeared. So a little after ten, the four of them were huddled around Lip in the living room. When the R appeared on his arm, Luz was doing cartwheels internally. His mother on the other hand snapped her fingers, swore, and went into the kitchen. His father told them not to mind her, she’d been holding out for a G. Over the next five minutes, the name Ronald Speirs appeared on Lip’s arm. When it was done, Luz elbowed Lip and told him congratulations, it’s a boy. Lip had only given the faintest of smiles. Lip said he’d kinda hoped it was someone he already knew, so they’d know. Now Ron was going spend two years wondering if he’d done something wrong. Luz tried to be reassuring, but Lip wasn’t really in the mood to be cheered up.

It was after that Luz convinced himself that he had to come clean to his parents. Mostly because he was starting to wonder if he was going to get a name. Maybe without sexual attraction, the universe didn’t bother handing out a name. Lip told him that was bullshit. Luz was going to get a name whether he wanted it or not. There had never been a reported case of someone not getting name, so since Luz was not the first of his kind, he was going to get a name.

So standing in his parent’s kitchen three days before his birthday, he told them he was ace. His mother had asked him if he was sure. Probably because she was reading the spectrum on his computer. His father had looked stricken and told his mom that wasn’t what you were supposed to say. His mom argued that that wasn’t how she met it. She just meant that hey, maybe he was demi. His father had read over her shoulder and he shook his head. When she looked at him, he just said Lip. And that seemed to settle it. His mother had told him once again this still didn’t get him out of grandkids.

Three days later, his mother got him out of school for lunch. They went for burgers at Luz’s favorite place and he tried to ignore his mother’s not so subtle attempts to see his arm. Finally just a little after they finished, the name started to appear. By the time they got to the courthouse, Frank Perconte was visible. His mother said she liked that name. She said it out loud, paired with his. ‘George and Frank.’ She nodded and told him the sooner they got this over with, the sooner they could get ice cream. She sent a picture of his arm to his dad at work that she took in the waiting room.

Luz just hoped Frank didn’t have his heart set on sex.

*~*

Brad slammed his bedroom door behind him so hard the shelf beside it rattled against the wall. There were three things he wanted to do when he turned eighteen. One, get his driver’s license. Two, get a tattoo. And finally, enlist in the Marines. There was nothing else on his list of things to do. He was not going to make a trip to the Office of Soulmate Registry unless his mother threw him in the trunk and dragged him there. He was not going to. He was not going to register Nathaniel Fick’s name like he was some kind of miserable doe-eyed romantic.

Brad picked up his laundry basket and hurled it into the back of his closet. He wasn’t going to register that stupid fucking pretentious name, but now he had to. Because the Marines wouldn’t take him if he was still color blind. He didn’t think that they had any right to demand something like that from him. How do you make a Marine, a steely eyed killer, out of someone that is dumb enough to fall for this incredibly stupid notion that there was just one right person for everyone. And if that wasn’t ridiculous enough, it got worse. There was allegedly a mysterious force that knew who that person was. It was an affront to his warrior spirit that they were going to make him indulge in this make believe bullshit. All for the price of color vision.

Brad glared at the envelope sitting on his desk. The whole crapshoot might be more livable if only his mother hadn’t been so damn smug about it. She’d never been secretive about the fact that she believed in this shit. She’d been trying to brainwash him into accepting this fairytale bullshit since he was a child and he was proud of the fact that it had yet to take. You would think that a woman in her position would see this crap for what it was. After all, the glorious union with her soulmate had yet to provide her with the one thing that she desperately wanted, a baby.

As he sat down at his desk, the plastic wrapping under his back crinkled. He picked up the envelope and opened it. He discarded the form letter and spread out the contact information on the smooth surface. Nathaniel Fick looked just as pretentious as Brad had imagined him to be. Nate, and of course that’s what he would prefer, was clearly the product of an upper middle class upbringing. The Baltimore suburbs appeared to have done an admirable job of raising the kind of man your mother hopes you marry. His own mother would probably have gushed about such a boy. Brad just glared at the picture in the corner, he would not be so easily taken in.

Nate looked like the kind of person that believed. He looked like the doe-eyed romantic that Brad loathed. So it appeared this was not going to be as easy as Brad hoped. He wasn’t going to be able to call his boy up and work out a meeting, lift the gray haze, and leave. Brad could tell Nate was going to have feelings. Nate was going to want to build something magical. Nate was going to want a future together. Brad couldn’t think of anything more repellant.

He’d dared to hope like that only once, to plan like that only once, and he wasn’t going to make that mistake again. He wasn’t going to let another person warp his thinking like that again. Several years ago he’d resigned himself to the fact that he was never going to be a part of one of those happy couples with pictures of themselves hung up all over his goddamn house. And in reflection, he was probably a better person for it. He’d be a stronger warrior for it. When he shipped off to some god forsaken wasteland, there would be nothing about home that he missed. He’d never be compromised by homesickness. He’d do his fucking job without wistfully daydreaming of some sweetheart that was miles away and whose existence made a warrior weak. He was never going to fall victim to that kind of cheap manipulation.

Brad took out his phone from his pocket and entered Nate’s number before he crumpled up the piece of paper and tossed it into the trash can. The best he could hope for was that Nate would be reasonable about this. That he would realize that he was unwanted and have the common decency to exit stage left. If he wasn’t though, it would hardly matter. Once Brad laid eyes on him, he’d have all he needed to enlist and he’d be shipped off to training and a war zone after that. Human nature would keep him far away from Nate and any of the feelings Nate found himself in possession of. Eventually Nate would set his sights on someone else; the desire to be loved would override any loyalty that Nate felt. Then they’d both have what they wanted.

One thing was certain though, Brad did not need a soulmate. He was more than capable of going it alone. He didn’t need anyone hold his god damned hand, he didn’t need someone’s fucking support. He was more than able to do this alone.

Brad Colbert didn’t need a soulmate.

Brad Colbert didn’t fucking want a soulmate.

Brad Colbert wasn’t going to have a soulmate.

And Nathaniel Fick was just going to have to adjust, because Brad was going to be damned if he was going to be the one to bend on this one. He’d rather give up on his dream then end up settled with someone for the rest of his life just so he could see color.

He’d rather live in world of gray then be trapped in something that wasn’t of his own choosing.  
He’d never seen color after all, he’d never needed it to survive, so he’d never know what he was missing out on.

*~*

Soulmates were something that everyone had an opinion on. One that they were always quick to tell you about. So from the time Bill Smith was small, everyone had an opinion about what he should do with the name on his arm. There were even picture books in the elementary school that, as an adult, he found more than a little disturbing. The only opinion he’d ever really listened to was that of his mother. She said she wanted him to meet the person and give them a fair chance. That seemed like something he could do for her.

She’d gotten him to San Francisco and so he figured it was a fair trade. When he was just about to start preschool, his mother had gotten a job offer. She was a photographer and the Art Institute of California in San Francisco was offering a teaching position. His father, who was an accountant, found another job and their family moved from Indian. Fresh starts all around.

His mother had been optimistic that in California he might make a friend. He hadn’t done so well with that at daycare. He just didn’t understand the point. Once you made a friend, you had to keep them and even that seemed like a lot of work. They wanted to come over to his house; play with his toys. That just had no appeal to him. It seemed like work. So her optimism was a little misplaced.

Except that it wasn’t, because at preschool about a block from his house, Bill Smith met Joe Liebgott and the rest, as they say, was history. Somewhere along the way, Bill was christened Hoosier. Not by Joe, but by one of their elementary classmates. Through no fault of his own, it just stuck. And from then on he was Hoosier. Only his teacher and his family called him Bill. Even Joe made the transition and Hoosier could tell that now when his mother called him Bill, it brought Joe up short. It felt wrong. And about that time, he started calling himself Hoosier. Introducing himself that way to new people he met. It helped keep a comfortable distance from people. Now they didn’t even know his name.

There was one person that was going to learn it soon. His soulmate. He was going to be the first of his friends to know who his soulmate was. The joy of having a January birthday. But the day drew closer and Hoosier couldn’t have been more indifferent if he had tried. He didn’t care. It didn’t matter who this person was. It just…Hoosier felt nothing. He couldn’t bring himself to care. He just couldn’t.

If it was up him, he’d have kept his sleeves down all day and just never looked at his arm. His mother was not in favor of this plan. So his mother made him sit in the kitchen while she made dinner, with his sleeve rolled up. A little after five, a name appeared on his arm slowly. Starting with R and after that, Hoosier officially lost interest. His mother was right and even though he’d considered that to himself nine years ago, he hated for her to be proven right.

When he was six, he came home convinced that he knew his soulmate. Looking back, he was probably too young to understand the concept of soulmates. There was a difference between compassionate love and romantic love and at six, that’s a difference that you might not be able to grasp. So as he understood it, using misinformation from adults, soulmates were supposed to be best friends. And at six, if you’d asked him who his best friend was, he’d have said Joe. Without hesitation, simply because there was no one else he liked that much. So using the warped logic that he had at his disposal, he reasoned that Joe was his soulmate. Once he landed on this conclusion, he had to tell someone, so he chose the only person he trusted more than Joe.

He told his mom. She’d come home from work and he’d been sitting at the kitchen table with his Legos. He told her he wanted to ask her something. She sat down next to him and gave him her complete attention. She was a good mother that way. He asked her if she thought Joe was his soulmate. Hoosier knew that the answer was no the minute his mother let out a breath and paused before speaking. She told him she didn’t think so. She thought Joe would always be his friend, but she didn’t think he was his soulmate. She thought that their soulmate would be similar. So he shouldn’t worry that they wouldn’t be friends when they grew up.  
This was not the answer that Hoosier was looking for. But as he grew older, he realized his mother might be on to something. So when the name Robert Leckie appeared on his arm in his kitchen, he wasn’t really disappointed. He was just numb. His mother was basket case, but he’d expected that too.

After that he’d watched with passive interest as his friends got their names. First Grant, then Joe, and then Tab.

He’d also watched as they found their soulmates. First Grant, whose Chris turned out to be something of an artist with a subtle sense of humor and a subdued personality that Hoosier could appreciate. Then Tab meet his Arlene. Stunningly pretty and somehow able to keep up with the boys. Her largest accomplishment by far was that she managed to tame Tab and made it look easy.

So he was happy for all his friends.

Well, all except Joe.

Joe’s soulmate was a no show.

Just like Hooiser’s.

He was glad that he could be there with Joe for this, because it affected Joe more then he let on. And he was glad his best friend could be there for him too, because it affected him in ways that he’d be damned if anybody ever knew.

He had his family. He had two good friends. He had the one best friend. And he didn’t need anybody else.

And maybe if he kept telling himself that, he’d believe it.

*~*

Ronald Speirs never considered himself a romantic and he was fine with that. He didn’t really consider it a trait you had to have to survive. Somehow he ended up with possibly the most romantic guy in Massachusetts for a best friend. He was still not clear on how that happened. They’d been in elementary school when Harry’s parents had moved for his dad’s job. Ron hadn’t been looking for a friend, but that hadn’t stop Harry from declaring Ron his friend. And once Harry decided something, there was just no talking him out of it. So they were friends and Harry started calling him Sparky. It never really occurred to Ron to ask why.

They could not be more different. Harry was outgoing. He never met a stranger he couldn’t get along with. People liked Harry. Ron avoided everyone, found people repellent at best. People didn’t like Ron. Some days, it seemed like they had nothing in common. Especially when it came to soulmates. Harry’s parents were soulmates. Harry loved the idea of soulmates. Harry was going to marry his soulmate. Ron’s parents were not soulmates. Ron did not like the idea of soulmates. Ron was not sure he wanted to even meet his soulmate.

So as their sixteenth birthdays approached, they were viewing it in entirely different ways. Harry glanced at his arm sometimes like the name might come in early. Ron started pulling his sleeves down over his wrists in March so that by the time April rolled around, maybe no one would notice. And despite Harry’s best efforts, Ron was not changing his mind. He wasn’t raised in a house where he was encouraged to marry his soulmate. It was just a name; it was nothing more than that. Everyone got one, it didn’t make it special. He didn’t stay up late to see the name come across his arm. He didn’t give it that much thought the following morning when he got ready for school. The first time he got a good look at it was the next day at school when Harry forced his sleeve up when he finally cornered Ron at his locker.

Carwood Lipton. There it was, right on his arm. It made Ron feel like shit that he didn’t feel any different about it once he read it. It was still just a name and Ron knew it was good thing his parents would let him register it.

It was a completely different story a few months later when Harry’s birthday arrived in September. They were sitting in the middle of their math class and Harry was paying more attention to his arm. When the full name, Catherine Grogan, appeared, Harry stroked his fingers across it. Ron couldn’t help but shake his head. He didn’t even know this girl; she was a collection of letters on his arms. Ron sighed. Harry glared at him.

It just got worse from there. To be fair, it was probably mostly Harry’s mother’s fault. If romance was a gene then Harry got it from his mother. But Harry started planning his life with Catherine, most likely the second he got home and showed his mom. Or maybe a little sooner. Knowing Harry, he might have worked it all out before he got home. Ron just couldn’t get there. How do you plan to marry someone just because their name turns up on your arm? He did feel bad for Harry that when he registered, Catherine wasn’t there. After that Harry deflated a little, but he still seemed convinced that their love would last a lifetime.

The period of limbo didn’t last long, about a week and a half actually. That night in October, Catherine became Kitty and their love would be the stuff of legend. If Ron had thought that Harry had been ridiculous before, that was nothing compared to what he was like after he talked to her on the phone. Kitty, naturally, had the most beautiful voice that Harry had ever heard. Ron sighed. This time though, Harry was on such a high that he didn’t even notice. Or if he did, he could hardly be bothered to care. Three business days later, the most beautiful voice had a face once the government forms arrived.

Kitty was not drop dead gorgeous. Even with Ron’s limited operation of women, he knew that. There was something about her though, maybe it was her eyes, which drew you in and kept you there. The form listed them as green, but in gray they shone with an assertiveness. Which was good because it would take that kind of determination to put up with Harry.

Though all of this, Ron remained reasonably indifferent. Both to Kitty and to Carwood. He was happy for Harry, really he was. At the same time, he was pretty sure Kitty wasn’t going to care for him. It wasn’t her fault. It was just that most people found Ron too quiet, cold or, worst of all, creepy. After that happened, Ron figured it was just a matter of time before he and Harry started to drift apart. Kitty was the love of Harry’s life and Ron was just his friend. One easily won out over the other.

At the beginning of November, Harry came over to his house with Kitty in tow. He introduced them and Ron promised himself that he was really going to try. Kitty shook his hand. Told him she’d heard wonderful things about him. She said it would really be great if they could be friends. She tilted her head so she could see his arm before adding, and of course Carwood too.

It was then that Harry told Kitty that old Sparky didn’t believe in that kind of thing. Kitty said oh, before trying to find something else to talk about.

And he didn’t. It was just a collection of letters. Everyone had one.

And then Ron met Kitty Gorgan.

After that, everything changed.

After Kitty went home, Ron looked at his arm. Traced the C just above his wrist and wondered what Carwood Lipton was like.


	2. Two

“So that’s the soulmate,” Walt’s mom said, coming up behind him. Walt was sitting in his bedroom, looking out the window that overlooked the Colbert’s driveway.

“That’s the soulmate,” Walt confirmed. They watched in silence for a moment as a lanky kid unloaded a suitcase from the back of Mrs. Colbert’s minivan. “I guess he’s staying with them while he goes to Stanford.”

“Ahh, that explains why Brad took out of here this morning with the engine revving,” his mom replied and she adjusted her hold on the laundry basket in her arms. 

Walt shrugged. Brad hadn’t exactly been forthcoming with details since his mother’s ‘sudden betrayal.’ “That was the deal though, Brad gets color vision and Nate gets in-state tuition. ‘Course I don’t think Brad thought his mom was going to offer out their spare bedroom behind his back.”

“Well good for Erica. Poor boy,” Walt’s mom said. “He’s got Brad Colbert for a soulmate; one would think he’d suffered enough. Let’s just hope the Persons are good people, because I won’t be nearly as diplomatic about it as Erica was. I’d have flown out to Maryland to kick their asses.”

Walt didn’t doubt her for a second. His mother sighed before she turned and headed back out of the room. Walt watched as Nate hauled a bicycle off the rack of the minivan before he returned his attention to his homework in front of him. He worked on it for an hour or so until Mrs. Colbert came over and asked if he could please come over and help Nate haul the new mattress up to the guest bedroom. The ‘because my son has disappeared’ was implied. She asked about his soulmate by dragging her hand across her arm and asking if there was any news. Walt shook his head; she told him December birthdays were worth waiting for. She would know - all her friends were paired off before she met Charlie. Walt smiled at her.

Nate seemed nice and he held up his end of the queen sized mattress, so at that moment that was all Walt cared about. When he’d gotten there, Mrs. Colbert had introduced him as ‘Brad’s only friend’. Walt knew that wasn’t true, but he didn’t bother to correct her. He helped Nate haul the old mattress back downstairs. When they got it pressed up against the wall, Nate cleared his throat. Ah, Walt thought, here it comes.

“Can I ask why you’re his friend?” Nate looked surprised when Walt laughed.

“Sorry, I just knew you were going to ask that,” Walt said, rubbing the back of his neck.

“You did?” Nate’s head tipped slightly.

“I get asked that a lot,” Walt said. “I know he’s not the easiest person to get along with, but he’s loyal as hell. He just…I’m pretty sure he feels trapped right now. He didn’t get any say in this and that’s probably making him crazy. It’s less about you then you’d think.”

Nate’s eyebrows drew together a bit as he stared down at the mattress.

“He’s not a bad guy. Just sometimes he’s a little bit of an asshole,” Walt said. He patted Nate’s shoulder as he passed, but that was about all he had for Nate. Brad was his friend, but it was up to Brad to figure out what to do with Nate.

As he walked back over to his house, he stopped and picked up the mail for his mom.

“Get the mattress moved?” she asked when he tossed the mail on the counter.

“Yep,” Walt said and he turned to head upstairs.

“Walt.” He turned back around and saw his mother holding up an envelope. He recognized the seal on the outside of the envelope.

“Why didn’t he call me?” Walt wasn’t really expecting his mother to answer. He just couldn’t help but blurt that out.

“I don’t know, honey. Maybe he was nervous,” his mom said as he took the letter.

He tore the envelope open and removed the paper inside. He unfolded it and tossed aside the form letter that came with what he really wanted, the contact information of his soulmate. There on the paper staring back at him was Ray, as the paper said he preferred to be called.

“You should call him. He obviously cares or he wouldn’t have registered the name,” his mother said. The ‘like Brad’, while unspoken, was implied.

Walt headed up to his room, dialing his phone as he walked. He’d just gotten to the top of the stairs-

“You called,” the voice on the other end said. The voice sounded breathy, like it had just run a mile.

“Yeah,” Walt said like that should have been a given, but he knew that it wasn’t.

“Well, you never know about you hippy California types,” Ray replied.

Walt didn’t know how he knew it, but he could tell Ray was teasing. “I’m from Virginia originally.”

“Why did you move out to the land of latte sipping pussy hybrids?”

“I was forcibly dragged here by my father and I’ve managed to resist most of their corrupting influences.”

“That’s good, because I don’t think I could bring some prissy city boy home to my mama.”

“I’m pretty sure I can handle it in…” Walt paused to look at the paper he was holding. “In Missouri. Jesus, you’re a fuckin’ messed up hick.”

“Says the boy from Virginia. Are your parents cousins?” 

And that’s when Walt really found the answer to Nate’s question. Ray’s humor was a special kind of humor. It took an understanding to get the joke and not see it as dig. It wasn’t personal and Walt knew that. All that joking just served to keep you away from the person underneath. The person underneath, who felt more than you would ever guess. It was all an act, but it was important that you learned how to play along. He’d had six years of training. He’d been put through his paces. So he knew he and Ray would be just fine.

*~*

“Would you stop fidgeting?” Luz’s mom said as she looked over at him sitting in the metal chair of the airport. “There is nothing to be nervous about.”

“Easy for you to say,” Luz replied. “You aren’t about to meet your soulmate.”

“No, but I’ve done this before,” his mother agreed. “I was the one on the plane though. It’s not any easier on that end.”

Luz nodded, trying to remember that. It was still hard not to be a little bit nervous. Figuring out that he was asexual had made life considerably easier. The problem was this new found knowledge didn’t come with an instruction manual. He had a long list of things he knew he didn’t want in a relationship. But not a lot of practical knowledge about what he did want.  
It didn’t help that he felt like a piece of crap because he was about to meet his soulmate and Lip was almost a year away from getting to register his name. After that, how long was it going to be before he actually found Ron? It made Luz sad for him. Meeting his soulmate was something Lip wanted; Luz was lukewarm on the subject. This should be happening for Lip since it was something he really wanted.

Luz noticed his mother straighten up a little bit. He followed her line of sight and noticed that Perco’s flight had landed. Luz took a deep breath and tried to relax. They had emailed back and forth for a month so he knew Perco in way. He knew him well enough that he had started calling him Perco in his head. Perco hadn’t suggested Skype and if he wasn’t then Luz sure the hell wasn’t going to do it for him. He had seen a picture of him, it was handed to him when he went in to register his name. He had to admit that he didn’t mind looking at Perco, even if he didn’t have any desire to have sex with him. 

Luz stood up and started walking around the lobby of the airport.

“You are going to wear holes in the carpet,” his mother said.

“This pattern is not worth saving. I’m doing them a favor really,” Luz replied, still moving.

She smiled at him, but she didn’t say anything else. Luz lost count of how long he’d been walking around like that, but when a crowd of people stated to mill around him, he turned around to see the passengers of Perco’s flight heading towards them. As the people passed, he finally caught sight of Perco. The world around him began to brighten as he walked towards him. Perco was a little shorter than Luz had imagined, but then Luz wasn’t exactly tall so that worked out. Luz was pleased to see that he too had avoided his mother’s attempts to get him to cut his hair. Luz did not see the point of getting dressed up for your soulmate. Isn’t this the person who is supposed to handle Luz at his worst? Even love him for it? It Perco couldn’t deal with a couple days past due for a haircut, then he wasn’t really in it for the long haul. It was nice to see that Perco seemed to be thinking the same way.

When Perco got over to them, he smiled and introduced himself to Luz’s mother. He was being very polite and Luz could tell his mother was eating it up with a spoon. When Perco’s mom got there, the parents started the awkward dance to get to know one another.

At this point Perco grabbed his wrist. “Come on, let’s go get my bag.” 

Luz followed along with Perco still holding his wrist as they made their way over to get the bags. He asked Perco how his flight was.

“Do you really care?” Perco asked.

“I feel like I should ask,” Luz said. “Though it can’t have been horrible, you’re still in one piece.”

Perco smiled. “Well, they were out of Dr. Pepper on the plane.”

“Dear God,” Luz said.

“I almost cried,” Perco deadpanned.

“The fridge is stocked at home.” Luz said.

“Thank you,” Perco said, placing a hand over his chest.

Luz smiled.

“So what has you mother got planned for this weekend? A cake tasting? Venue hunting?” Perco asked. “I’m pretty sure that my mother brought her list of names for the invitations.”  
Luz laughed. Their mothers had both really taken the soulmates thing very seriously. They had begun to joke that their mothers were probably already planning their wedding behind their backs. “Well, I have Halo the Master Chief Collection.”

“That’s a solid weekend,” Perco said.

“And Dr. Pepper in the fridge,” Luz reminded him. “And you should see the snacks I convinced my mother to buy.”

“So we’ll play Halo and let our mothers plan our wedding,” Perco said nodding. “That sounds like a plan.”

It was at that moment that Luz noticed that Perco was still holding his wrist. Luz decided that that was ok. More than ok actually; Luz kinda liked it. It was reassuring in a way. Holding hands though seemed sudden. And maybe a little overly needy. Luz prided himself on not being overly needy. So Luz just figured he’d follow Perco’s lead and if it went into dangerous waters, he’d steer them back. 

Later that night, sitting on the floor of Luz’s bedroom with xbox controllers in hand, Luz learned some other things he didn’t mind. He didn’t mind when their legs pressed together. He didn’t mind when Perco squeezed his leg because he’d pulled off something miraculous. He didn’t mind when Perco rested his head on his shoulder. And he didn’t mind when Perco fell asleep there while they watched a movie. And later that night when he woke up, he found Perco had drifted onto his side of the bed and had his arm around Luz’s waist. Well, Luz thought that was probably the best part and he could work with that too.

*~*

“Joe, how do I look?”

“Fine,” Joe said, not looking up from the graphic novel he was reading. “Why do you care what Chris’ hipster douchebag friends think?”

“I care what his teachers think and this is important. It’s his senior exhibition show thing. Did I mention his parents are going to be there? So can you do me the supreme favor of at least looking at me.”

It was the hysteria in Grant’s normally calm voice that made Joe look up. “You look fine. Jesus.”

“Thank you that ringing endorsement,” Grant said with a sigh.

“You look great,” Tab called from down the hall. “Now stop worrying or you’re actually going to be late.”

“I’ll see you over there,” Grant called down the hall. “Are you sure you won’t come?”

“Yeah, hanging out with college hipsters is exactly how I want to spend my Saturday,” Joe replied.

Grant gave him a suffering look like it wasn’t really how he wanted to spend his either. But his soulmate’s work was hanging on gallery walls. Sure it was a school sponsored show, but Joe figured that was still something you were obligated to show up to.

After Grant left, Tab walked into the living room, pulling on a jacket. “So you’re just going to sit here at home?”

“Sure, why not?” Joe said, putting his feet up on the coffee table in front of him.

Tab sighed. “You know, Arlene knows a guy…”

“You mean some other sad sack whose soulmate doesn’t want him?” Joe asked. “Yeah, I don’t think I’m ready to be that guy.”

“Well, at least that guy goes out into public,” Tab said before he headed out the door.

Joe didn’t say anything. He just let Tab leave without a reply. He knew he was pathetic. He didn’t need to be reminded. But they just didn’t understand. Every day that ticked by was just another slow step towards the inevitable. Because at the end of this year, if David Webster hadn’t turned up, it was no longer because his parents were homophobes, it was because he simply wasn’t interested. And Joe hadn’t quite figured out a way to pretend that that didn’t hurt. So yeah, he was going to sit at home alone on a Saturday night.

In so many ways, it was easier.

A knock at the door pulled Joe out of his depression.

“You have a key,” Joe said when he opened the door to Hoosier standing on the other side, holding two six packs of beer. When Joe and Hoosier had graduated last week, the three of them - Tab, Joe, and Hoosier - moved into this house. Hoosier was going to a technical college, something involving cars. Tab was selling cars at a dealership about a mile from their house. And come Monday, Joe would be driving one. Since barbers’ college frowned on you being color blind, Joe was going to drive a cab. Grant was staying with them for the summer. Or at least he was if you asked Chris’ parents. Once they went back to Oakland this week, he was staying with Chris. In the fall, he’d go back to school.

“But that would have involved putting the beer down,” Hoosier said, weaving past Joe into the apartment. “Don’t make that face, I ordered a pizza.”

“I already ate,” Joe said, closing the door behind him.

“Thanks for sharing. I don’t know what that has to do with me ordering a pizza,” Hoosier said as he headed for the kitchen.

“Where did you even get beer?” Joe said, following behind his best friend.

“Older classmate,” Hoosier said as he opened one of the bottles on the edge of the counter. “Everyone else head over to that art bullshit?”

Joe shook his head. At this point he didn’t even consider correcting Hoosier because he knew it wouldn’t do any good. “Yeah, Grant said they’d call if they went anywhere after.”

Hoosier made a noncommittal noise and Joe knew Hoosier wasn’t going, but he offered probably for the same reason Tab did. Because Hoosier was counting the days too, Hoosier was just better at pretending he didn’t give a shit. Or maybe he really didn’t give a shit. It was hard to tell with Hoosier.

Joe removed one of the beers from the six pack and, unlike Hoosier, got the bottle opener.

“I don’t care what you say, we aren’t getting the deposit back,” Hoosier said, walking around Joe.

“Not if you keep fucking up the counter opening beer bottles,” Joe replied.

“Here,” Hoosier said, pulling out his wallet and tossing it on the counter. “There’s cash in there for the pizza. I’m gonna take a shower.”

Joe didn’t reply because it wasn’t like Hoosier was looking for permission. Joe stood there for a couple of minutes drinking his beer, standing over the kitchen sink. He was standing, bottle halfway to his mouth when there was a knock at his door.

“Yeah, I’m coming,” Joe grabbed Hoosier’s wallet off the counter and walked out of the kitchen. When he opened the door, he hadn’t even gotten a good look at the guy when everything changed. When he finally looked at the guy’s face, he got stuck on the eyes. He thought they were blue, but he’d never actually seen blue as blue before; it had always been just another shade of gray. They gave you a pamphlet when you register your soulmate, so he’ll have to check. His hair was messy and dark. In Joe’s professional opinion, he needed a haircut. And those were all the thoughts that Joe had about David Webster before he slammed the door in his face. He stood there for a couple seconds before he opened the door again. Webster was still standing there and Joe didn’t know whether to be relieved or pissed.

“Where the fuck have you been?” Joe could hardly be blamed that he settled on pissed.

“Boarding school,” Webster said. “You know, you have very gender specific name.”

“Is that my fucking pizza?” Hoosier called as he walked into the room. He was standing there in jeans with his hair still wet.

“No, it’s my fucking soulmate,” Joe said, still holding the door. He was considering slamming it again just to prove his point. What that point was, he wasn’t sure.

“Congratulations, let me know when my fucking pizza gets here.” Hoosier turned around and started walking back to his room.

“Robert Leckie,” Webster said and everyone froze.

“Fuck’s it to you?” Hoosier said, turning back.

“He was my uhh…roommate at boarding school. He thought he was on the way to your house…”

“Fuck,” Hoosier cursed, running back to his room, when he returned with a white t-shirt on. He maneuvered past them and ran down the street in the direction of his truck.

“That’s what you get for lying to your mother,” Joe yelled after him.

“Fuck you,” Hoosier said.

“I hope she has the kettle on and the baby pictures out when he gets there,” Joe said. “Are you coming in or not?”

“You don’t want to slam the door in my face again?” Webster asked.

“No, I think I got it out of my system,” Joe said.

“Imagine my joy,” Webster said as he picked up a green duffel before he walked into the house.

“Hey, fuck you,” Joe said. “I was waiting for two years feeling a certain way about you. You don’t get to show up here and flip the script and expect me to start feeling sorry for you in the span of five fucking minutes.”

“My birthday’s in June, you’d had to wait a month anyway,” Webster said.

“Yeah well, a month is reasonable, but somewhere after December, you start to feeling like you’re not fucking wanted,” Joe said.

“That’s not my fault,” Webster said. “Look, I ran away from my own graduation…”

“Good for you,” Joe said.

“Fuck you, I did it because I wanted to meet you. Because I thought this fucking meant something,” Webster said. And that’s the first time Joe’d seen it, his name on someone else’s arm. He didn’t ever think that would make him feel something.

“Fuck,” Joe whispered. He turned his head because he couldn’t look at Webster’s arm. “Do you have a place to stay?”

“What?” Webster said, surprised. “Uh, no.”

“Great, you can sleep on the couch,” Joe said as he headed for his room and slammed the door behind him.

There was a blanket on the back of the sofa, but Joe still sat awake for the better part of the night feeling guilty about being an asshole.

When he woke up in the morning, he found Webster sitting at his kitchen table, typing away at a laptop. He’d started the coffee going and Joe figured that was a nice olive branch.

“Your friend didn’t come home last night…Bill?” he said by way of greeting.  
“Hoosier,” Joe said as he headed for the coffee pot.

“What?” Webster said.

“He answers to Hoosier,” Joe said. “What are you doing?”

“Applying to colleges,” Webster said and he still hadn’t looked up from the screen.

“Here?” Joe asked.

“I like being near the water,” Webster replied. And while that wasn’t really an answer, it was in a way.

“You need a haircut,” Joe said as he drank his coffee.

“Ok,” Webster replied. “I’ll put it on my to-do list.”

“I’ll do it,” Joe said.

“Is this a trust exercise?” Webster asked as he looked at Joe. “If I let you fuck up my hair, are you going to let me off the hook?”

“I’m not going to fuck up your hair. My dad’s a barber and he’s been teaching me. I was going to go to school for it, but up until last night, I was colorblind.” Joe shifted uncomfortably.

“Well, then I guess meeting me wasn’t a total loss,” Webster said, returning his attention to the computer.

“I wanted to hate you, ok? That was easier. And now that it’s not your fault…”

“You can’t hate me for it,” Webster finished.

“I suppose I should apologize for not having a girl’s name,” Joe said.

“It’s not…I got passed that phase,” Webster.

“So let me cut your hair and I’ll get through mine,” Joe said.

Webster paused and seemed to consider this for a moment.

“And you can put this address down on those forms,” Joe said, gesturing at Webster’s computer.

Webster’s brow furrowed.

“My mother would never let me forget it if I didn’t try to help you out,” Joe replied. “I just need time to adjust. I didn’t think you were ever coming and now…”

“That’s fair,” Webster said. “They make it sound easy. Soulmates. It doesn’t work out that way for everyone. Maybe the struggle makes it real.”

Joe nodded. Maybe it did.

*~*

Dick Winters sat nervously in the back of his parents’ car. It was almost two in the morning and they were waiting outside his best friend’s house. They were waiting for 2:08 exactly. 2:08 on January 21st, Dick's sixteenth birthday. At 2:08, a name would start to rise on his arm. It would form a tattoo that would be with him for the rest of his life, the name of his soulmate. Dick had grown up believing that he knew it was going to be Lew, it had to be Lew. Who else could it be? It needed to be Lew; otherwise Lew was going to have to stay in this hellhole.

"Only two more minutes," his dad said.

"Is there anything, dear?" his mom said, turning in her seat.

It had been his mother's idea to be here right when the mark came up. The law said soulmates could live together at 16 if one of them was being mistreated. Lew was being mistreated.

Dick cast the light of his phone over his arm. "Nothing yet."

His mother sighed. Dick kept the light on his arm, the longest two minutes of his life. He knew it was impossible, but he swore he held his breath. Finally he saw it. The faint outlines of the lettering: Lewis Nixon III.

"It's him," Dick said, already halfway out the car door. His parents followed quickly after him.

"I'll get the boxes, you two just go," his mother called as she headed for the back of the car. Dick was already halfway up the walk, his father hot on his heels. When he got to the door, he started frantically ringing the bell. When his father got there, he started banging on the door with a closed fist.

"It come in all the way?" he asked.

Dick showed him his arm; Lew's name now in dark block letters.

"Good," his father nodded. Dick knew it was because if Lew’s parents called the cops, he'd need the mark to prove Lew was his. When the door opened, Dick shoved his way past; he could hear his dad arguing with Lew's father behind him. He did give it a second thought, but he was just after Lew. When he got to the top of the stairs, he banked left. He hit Lew's door at full speed and started knocking with an open palm. "Lew, it's me. It's Dick. Open up. It rose."  
The door opened and Lew was standing there, eyes bleary with sleep.

"It's you," Dick said, holding out his arm. And as he said it, colors bloomed in Dick's vision and he knew it was true. All this time he’d been right. He always thought he would be, but it was nice to have the confirmation. Nicer still to know that Lew’s hair was black and his eyes a deep brown.

Lew's fingers trembled as he touched the mark. "It's me?"

Dick pulled Lew into his arms and pressed a kiss to his head.

"Of course it's you, honey. Who else would it be?" His mother asked, coming up the stairs. "Honey, I'm just going to load everything into boxes and we can sort out what you want and don't want later." She went right to the closet and pulled open the doors. She taped the bottom of the box and started throwing Lew's clothes into it.

"Boxes?" Lew asked.

"You're leaving with me," Dick said.

"But mine hasn't come in yet," Lew said.

"There can't be that many Lewis Nixon III's in the world," his mother said, bringing a pair of tennis shoes over and a pair of socks. "Put these on, dear. We'll be leaving soon."

Lew still looked unsure, like everything might be taken away from him.

"I'll pass the color test," Dick said, holding him tighter.

"Really?" Nix gasped. Before you met your soulmate, you couldn't see color. The world before was all different shades of gray. But the first time you saw your soulmate after their name rose on your arm, the world was full of color.

There was a loud crash as Dick’s mother dropped a load of Lew’s clothes into the box, hangers and all. That seemed to snap Lew out of his daze; he moved quickly over to his desk chair and pulled on first his socks, then his shoes. After that he grabbed one of the boxes Dick’s mom had brought. Dick moved over to help him and together they got the box taped shut. Dick started tossing in things from the bottom of Lew’s closet, while Lew pulled his drawers clean out of his desk and dumped the contents into the box.

The whole room stopped when they heard sirens. Dick’s mother sighed. “Dick, sweetheart, go downstairs and wait with your father. Lewis and I will finish with this.”

When Dick got to the stairs, the police officer was already waiting at the bottom with Lew’s parents and Dick’s father.

“Is this your son?” the officer asked Dick’s father.

He nodded. “That’s my son.”

Dick reached the bottom of the stairs. The officer stepped towards him.

“Do you mind if I have a look at your arm?”

Dick rolled up the sleeve of his hoodie and held out his arm. Lew’s mother gasped and looked away. The officer opened an alcohol swab before he rubbed the name down. It didn’t wipe off. He then took out an ultraviolet light and shined it over the mark. It did not change.

“Son, I’m going to show you some cards, I want you to tell me what number you see.”  
Dick nodded.

That night Edie Winters said her prayers, as she did every night. “Heavenly Father, please watch over my husband as he provides for his family. Bless my darling daughter as she finds her way in the world. Bless my precious son and smooth the troubles that may block his path. Father, thank you for the blessing you’ve bestowed on our family tonight. Thank you for delivering my son’s soulmate safe into our home where he belongs. Help me to be the mother he deserves. Watch over their love, Father. Protect it from the evils of this world, as you have always done for Richard and I. Amen.”

*~*

“I’m coming, I’m coming. God damn it, Harry,” Ron swore as he grabbed a scarf off the coat hook by the door. He knew that Harry could hear him and yet he still kept ringing the doorbell. “Jesus Christ, Harry,” Ron said as he opened the door and finished putting his coat on. He sighed when he noticed Kitty was standing on the porch too. “You didn’t try to stop him?”

“He was having too much fun,” Kitty said, smiling as she stuffed her hands into her coat’s pockets. Ron rolled his eyes. “Happy birthday by the way.” She was still smiling.

“She wouldn’t let me stand out here singing to you,” Harry said, patting Ron’s shoulder.

Kitty shrugged. “Someone might have called the cops.”

Ron smiled at her and the three of them took off walking towards where they could catch the train. They had to first go to the DMV and update Ron’s driver’s license. Then they had to go register Ron as Carwood’s soulmate. It was a full morning of sitting and waiting on the government to move at a speed that resembled normal. Not for the first time, Ron hoped Carwood was worth it. They loaded onto the train. Kitty took an open seat while the boys held onto the handrails.

“You didn’t have to come along. I’m a big boy, I could have done this myself,” Ron said.

“Sure you could have,” Harry said. “But why should we give up a perfectly good chance to skip school?”

“Besides,” Kitty added. “Carwood is going to be the fourth member of our little group for the rest of our lives. I’d like to say I was there from the beginning.”

Ron sighed and shook his head.

“Aww come on, Sparky,” Kitty said, taking a swat at Ron’s arm. “Why are you still so cynical about this?”

“Sparky is going to be cynical until he dies.” Harry bummed his shoulder against Ron’s.

“He’s not wrong,” Ron said in response to Kitty’s question.

“Well, I think you are. Carwood is going to find your particular brand of standoffishness to be charming,” Kitty replied.

“Jesus,” Harry swore. “That would be something.”

Kitty gave Harry a look that was equal parts chastising and long suffering.

They rode the rest of the way to the DMV, in silence. Kitty did keep smiling at Ron. Ron ignored her. The DMV was a long and arduous process, completed with posing for something that was comparable with a mugshot. The girl behind the counter wished him a happy birthday, Ron just nodded as he kept his eyes on the form. With that done, it was a trip downstairs and to the third door on the left. This was followed by more waiting in terribly uncomfortable chairs. Finally, he got ushered into one of the offices and then the process was pretty much the same. His identity was confirmed, Carwood’s name authenticated, and once again he posed for a mug shot.

“Would it have killed you to smile?” Kitty asked when the attendant had left the room.

“It might have,” Harry said.

Ron didn’t bother to respond. It would just encourage her.

After what a period of time that Ron believed was probably excessive, the attendant returned and handed him an envelope. And informed him that one would be mailed out to his soulmate tomorrow. Ron nodded his head and put the envelope in his coat pocket. She wished him a happy birthday and Ron just stared at her. They filed out of the room and Kitty made a grab for the envelope as they walked. She tried again on the stairs and again as Ron held the door open for her.

“Please tell me you aren’t going to be a chickenshit and wait for him to call you,” Kitty said as they walked back for the train.

“He’s probably still in school,” Ron replied. “You know, that thing we skipped today.”

Kitty’s eyes narrowed.

“Hey, let’s go see a movie,” Harry said, making a show of checking his phone. “By the time we get out, he’ll probably be out.”

“Ok,” Kitty said, sounding excited.

Ron just made a lead the way gesture. They took their positions much the same way they had from the beginning. Once the train took off down the tracks, Ron removed the envelope from his pocket and handed it to Kitty. Kitty didn’t ask if he was sure, she just took the envelope and tore it open. She removed the piece of paper and unfolded the top third. She smiled fondly at the photo before she unfolded the letter.

“Well, he’s living in West Virginia.” Kitty sounded disappointed by that. “He’s only been registered since January. So that’s good because he could have been waiting for years.”  
Ron didn’t know why that information made him feel better. 

“I think he’s darling,” Kitty said before she folded the letter back to Ron.

Ron returned it to his pocket.

“Are you going to open it?” Harry asked.

Ron shrugged. The letter stayed in his pocket all the way to the theater, and all through the movie once they chose it. He didn’t take the letter out of his pocket until he was standing outside the Cheeses place they’d gone to because Kitty was starving.

Ron tried not to acknowledge the fact that she was most likely watching him from the window as he dialed Carwood’s number. While he listed to the phone ring, he studied the warm inviting smile Carwood had managed for his photo.

“Hello,” a voice on the other end of the phone said.

“Yeah…um,” Ron fumbled. “I’m calling for Carwood Lipton.”

“That’s…uh…that’s me.”

Ron took a deep breath. “This is Ron Speirs.”

“Could you give me just a second?” Before Ron could respond there was what sounded like a scuffle on the end of the phone, followed by a slamming door, and finally a shouted “Luz I know you’re still standing out there in the hallway.”

Ron felt himself smiling without his consent. He knew that tone. That was the tone you used on your best friend.

He heard a cleared throat noise before Carwood returned. “Sorry, I’m just deeply regretting a six year friendship.”

“If it makes you feel any better, if I turned around, I’d probably see my best friend’s soulmate with her face pressed up against the window of a restaurant watching me make this call.”

There was a small laugh on the other end of the phone and Ron decided he liked that sound. “It does actually. So is today your birthday?”

“Yeah,” Ron replied. “It’s been official since a little after two in the morning.”

“Happy birthday,” Carwood said.

Ron smiled and for the first time that day, he didn’t try to brush it off. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. Jesus, that was lame. Why don’t you just tell me what you did today and we can forget I ever said that.”

Ron wondered if Carwood was blushing and what that would look like as he started telling him about running down the stairs to Harry ringing his doorbell.

*~*

Hoosier slammed the palm of his hand against the steering wheel of his truck. It was after dark on his parents’ street and the curbs were lined with cars. Hoosier got out of his car and shut the door harder than necessary. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and started walking the two blocks to his parents’ house. After a block, he passed Joe’s parents’ house. He could see light flooding the backyard from the family room. Hoosier considered knocking on the door and telling Mary that Joe’s soulmate had turned up on their doorstep. But he kept walking, he was a slightly better friend than that.

As he neared his own house, he could see that the lights were out and he exhaled. He wanted to make up his own mind about what to do with his soulmate. He didn’t need his mother’s overly helpful influence. When he got a little closer, he realized that their car wasn’t even in the driveway. And then he remember that his parents were going to Napa for the weekend and wouldn’t be back until Wednesday. 

Hoosier started walking a little slower now that the sense of having to race his mother to his soulmate was gone. He’d pretty much convinced himself over the course of the last year that if he ever met his soulmate, he wouldn’t care. Course Joe had always said he was going to punch his in the face and Webster’s face had looked ok when he’d left. So it turned out that you couldn’t just convince yourself that you felt nothing. Because he did; he was nervous and more than a little curious. Who was this boy? And what the hell took him so long? As he approached the house, he saw that someone was sitting on the porch swing, rocking back and forth.

“You know that thing is older then you are,” Hoosier said. It was a lie, his mother had replaced it after the back had fallen off when his father leaned on it too hard. But Leckie didn’t need to know that. Hoosier leaned against the chain-link gate. “It’s pulled out of that ceiling before.”

It was another lie, but this one had the figure jumping out of the porch swing and out onto the steps. He was reasonable tall and lanky. His hair had a tight messy curl to it and his eyes were shining dangerously in the light cast off by the streetlight. There was a small backpack over his shoulder. The color now seeping into Hoosier’s vision was only making him more attractive.

"Either you’re my soulmate or the neighbors called the cops, but since color vision came with the deal, you must be Bill. So is this the part where we run away together?"

"Take a number," Hoosier said, still leaning against the gate, not trusting himself to walk any further.

"You don't think this gets me to the head of the line?" Leckie asked and rolled up his sleeve so Hoosier could see his first name. He walked over to the gate and rested his arm next to Hoosier’s.

"What is that, Sharpie?" Hoosier said as he dragged his finger over the B.

"Fuck you. I took three buses from the airport to get here."

"Congratulations," Hoosier deadpanned. "Do you want a medal?"

“No, but maybe you could invite me in so I’m not standing out here like some kind of stalker. I wasn’t kidding; there is a reasonable possibility that one of your neighbors might have called the cops.” Leckie’s smile was somewhat lopsided like both sides of his mouth weren’t getting the same information. It shouldn’t make Hoosier want to kiss him.

“You’re going to have to move.” Hoosier pushed on the gate to indicate the problem.

“Oh yeah,” Leckie said, moving out of the way and waving towards the door with a little wave of his hand. “Lead the way.”

Hoosier rolled his eyes and walked towards his parents’ front door. He pulled his keys out of his pocket and unlocked the door. He noticed that there was a small suitcase by the door. He tossed his keys into the bowl out of habit and headed to the kitchen to see if his dad had any beer in there. He almost cheered when he found the remains of a twelve pack in the fridge.

“Do you actually live here?” Hoosier looked back out into the dining room. Leckie was tracing his fingers along the edge of his mother’s lace table covering, backpack still hanging off one shoulder. “Or did we just break into some nice family’s house?”

“Are you saying this house doesn’t look like me?” Hoosier opened two beers with the bottle opener that his dad kept on the fridge.

“I know I only just met you.” Hoosier walked over to Leckie and held out a beer. Leckie took it by the neck of the bottle. “Thanks, but yeah, I’m going to go with no.” Leckie took a pull of his beer.

Hoosier smiled. “But I do look like someone that is capable of B&E. Good to know.”

“I’m still forming that judgment.” Leckie tipped his head to the side as if that would give him a new perspective on Hoosier. “I’m not disparaging your character or anything. Just trying to figure out if I’m signing up for a life of crime.”

“It’s my parents’ house; I live across town,” Hoosier clarified.

“So you just happened by?”

“You’re roommate gave you up.”

“My…” Leckie trailed off before almost doubled over laughing. He collected himself before he asked, “Do you know Joe?”

“Since I was three,” Hoosier replied.

Leckie smiled. “And just when Web thought he was rid of me. So you’re not a deviant, just forgetful?” Leckie returned to looking at Hoosier with his head slightly tipped. He was staring at Hoosier intently like he might be trying to read his mind.

“Something like that.” Hoosier stepped away from Leckie, walking into the living room and sat down on the sofa.

Leckie followed him into the room, clearly still appraising Hoosier. “Did you think I wasn’t going to turn up?” Hoosier said nothing, but Leckie still seemed to have found an answer. “Look, I have a December birthday. I did the best I could.”

The gears ground in Hoosier’s head for a moment. “So you're still...”

“Seventeen,” Leckie finished for him. 

“Then how did you get my address?” Hoosier asked. You had to eighteen to register a soulmate without a parent’s signature.

“Fake ID,” Leckie said before he took another drink of his beer.

“So that’s why you weren’t phased by the B&E.” Hoosier leaned back against the sofa, getting slightly more comfortable.

Leckie shrugged. “In for a penny.”

And Hooiser nodded, figuring that was about right.

*~*

Brad hadn’t expected anyone to be home when he pulled his bike into the driveway. When he’d called his mother to let her know when his flight was getting in, she’d told him that she and his father could take the day off. He told her he’d just go see some friends. The pause on the other end of the phone had told him a lot about the way his mother thought of him.

When he reached his bedroom, he wasn’t surprised that his mother had edited it in his absence. She’s taken down most of the posters that he’d hung to cover the god awful blue wallpaper she’d chosen. He opened his closet to toss his duffel in it, but stopped when he discovered the boxes labeled ‘Christmas Directions’. He frowned when he noticed the handwriting. It wasn’t the neat all capital letters of his father. It also was not the feminine flowing script of his mother.

“Your mom warned me you were coming home today.”

And there was the answer as to whom the handwriting belonged to.

“I thought that was sweet of her.”

Brad turned to see Nate leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest.

“Give me a chance to skip your charming personality.”

“Ahh, still taking every advantage of my mother’s bleeding heart, I see,” Brad said as he set his duffel bag on the bed.

“Don’t pretend that you care,” Nate said.

“Simply making an observation,” Brad replied.

“They teach that in Marines?” Nate asked.

“Among other things,” Brad said as he sat down on his bed.

Nate shook his head. “Do me a favor.”

“Don’t you think you’ve gotten enough of those?”

“Just spend one night here having dinner with your mom. She misses you,” Nate said before he pushed off the doorway and started down the hall. Brad wasn’t going to follow him until he heard the clinking of metal coming from what had been the guest bedroom. With curiosity getting the better of him, he followed after to see Nate setting the ironing board in what was now very clearly his room. Even though nothing about the room had changed, it was now dotted with Nate’s things.

“What are you doing?” Brad asked as he leaned against Nate’s doorframe.

“Ironing,” Nate replied, but when he looked up at Brad he continued. “My graduation is tonight. I don’t want to look like I rolled out of bed.”

“I didn’t know that,” Brad said.

“I know. I told your mother not to tell you,” Nate replied. “Not that you’d be interested even if she had.”

Nate walked over to his closet and pulled out a blue shirt that Brad’s mother would called corn flower. He knew this because if Nate held the shirt up to the wallpaper behind him, it would have been a match.

“What did you major in?” Brad asked.

Nate paused in his ironing and looked up at Brad as he removed the iron from the shirt. “Are we really doing this?”

“This?” Brad asked.

“This,” Nate gestured between the two of them. “Where we swap stories like we didn’t spend the last four years ignoring each other’s existence?”

Brad shrugged.

“Fuck you,” Nate said before returning his attention to his ironing.

Brad was about to go raid his mother’s kitchen when Nate slammed the butt of the iron down onto the ironing board.

“You know, I was fine with us being two ships passing in the night while you were home. I’d prepared for that. So fuck you. You don’t get to come home and pretend that chatting about my major has been par for the course. I don’t know what kind of head trauma you suffered after you enlisted, but I am no longer interested.” Nate picked the iron back up and resumed his efforts to get the collar to lay right.

“But you were at one point?” Brad asked.

“Yeah, when I was sixteen and stupid,” Nate said, not looking up from the cuffs of his shirt. “Don’t worry, you snuffed out the last embers of that optimism.”

Brad shifted uncomfortably against the doorframe. He knew that he’d done a fair amount of damage when he’d left for basic. He knew that his relationship with his parents had suffered for it. He hadn’t really realized, or cared, that he and Nate had hadd a relationship to damage. He understood now that Nate had been in possession of an idea of what soulmates were and Brad had backed over that on his way out of the driveway.

“You’re better off without it,” Brad said.

“Guess you learned that the hard way,” Nate said as he gave the shirt a once over.

“Who gave me up?” Brad asked, though he was pretty sure he knew the answer.

“Your mom,” Nate said as he returned the shirt its hanger. “I tried to get it out of Walt, but he kept your secret.”

“Good for him,” Brad said.

“I know it doesn’t mean anything, but I am sorry that happened…” Nate might have said something more, but he trailed off.

“Are we doing this?” Brad asked.

“You started it,” Nate replied.

Brad shook his head.

“Political Science and the classics,” Nate said.

“What?” Brad said, looking up.

“My major. Or majors, I guess,” Nate said while he pulled a pair of pants out of the closet. 

“Double major. Your parents must be so proud,” Brad said.

“Yours are,” Nate said.

But Brad could tell that that wasn’t enough. “Well, fuck ‘em. It’s their loss.”

“I guess,” Nate replied. “You know, if you are serious about this and have shoes other than those boots, you’re welcome to go with your parents tonight. But if you aren’t, then do me a favor and fuck off. I can’t handle your indifference again, once was more than enough.”

Brad nodded. “I think I have something that will work.”

“Ok then,” Nate said as he spread his pants out over the board.

“I’m not wearing a tie,” Brad said.

“No one asked you to.” Nate smiled. It was the first time Brad had ever seen Nate smile and he realized that he wanted to see it again.

*~*

There was a knock at the door.

“Oh Jesus,” Babe said, smoothing out his shirt.

Bill laughed, the fucker.

Frannie smiled. “Why don’t you go answer the door? Don’t want to leave your soulmate standing on the stoop.”

Babe took a deep breath and allowed Frannie to shove him forward slightly. He didn’t know why he was nervous; he’d been talking to Gene on phone for a little while now. Ever since October and here it was, three days after Christmas, so he should not be nervous. It wasn’t like he didn’t know what Gene looked like. The card containing Roe’s personal details had arrived three days after Gene had first called. So he was being melodramatic. When he opened the door, it was not like the Wizard of Oz. The second the door left the frame to the outside, the world didn’t bloom into color. And Babe would be lying if he said he wasn’t a little bit disappointed by that. Once he got the door open and he got a good look at the pale boy with dark hair standing on the other side of it, then it was a little Oz. The grays slowly faded into brighter colors.

“Hi,” he said, and he hated himself for that for just a minute. Because wow, smooth opening line of hi.

“Hello,” Gene said in response.

“Babe, aren’t you going to invite them in?” Frannie sounded very disappointed. Well, Babe had to admit he seemed to have lost his manners. “I’m sorry about him, really I am.”

“It’s really fine,” said the woman that was also standing outside next to Gene. She was pale like Gene and had the same dark hair. Babe was a little embarrassed that he was just now noticing her. He’d just gotten stuck there for a moment.

Frannie decided she was going to have to make the introductions. Babe learned that Gene’s mama was named Maud. Babe was only half listening; he was still staring at Gene, who was still staring at him. Frannie seemed to notice this too, because she ushered Gene’s mom into the kitchen.

“Well, welcome to my room,” Babe said, gesturing around the living room.

Gene smiled. “It’s roomie, very open. Not a lot closet space.”

“Can’t have it all,” Babe said with a shrug as he sat on the couch. He patted the couch next to him.

Gene smiled uncomfortably, but he sat down next to Babe so close that their knees touched. Babe’s arms were rested on his knees. Gene touched Babe’s arm and pushed so he would turn it over. When Babe did, Gene traced his fingers over his name on Babe’s arm. Gene was watching his fingers trace over the letters.

“Thank you,” Gene whispered.

“What?” Babe was surprised.

“For running away for me,” Gene clarified. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“Hell I didn’t,” Babe responded, his voice raised slightly. “You’re my soulmate.”

Gene smiled. “You say that…” Gene trailed off and shook his head.

Babe took Roe’s hand in his and squeezed.

“My mama had me really young before she met her soulmate. By the time they found each other...well, he wasn’t thrilled that she already had a child. So you didn’t have to, when things got tough, you could have bailed.” 

“No, I couldn’t,” Babe shook his head. He’d never even considered that. Everything he had learned in church had told him that the name on his arm was chosen for him by God. Frannie certainly believed that and while he was living with her and Bill, there was no reason to think it wasn’t. If he and Gene were half as happy as Bill and Frannie, then they would be just fine.

So he had never thought twice about it when he realized that he’d have to leave his family. And the road after that had been a little rocky. Babe had decided in the interest of being able to support himself, he’d dropped out of high school. He’d spent the next few months working at the kitchen table to get his GED. He’d spent the next few months working full time, saving aside some money. Bill had told him to stay with them until the end year, in case he wanted to move out of state. Bill could be pretty smart sometimes, because now Louisiana was starting to look pretty good. 

“I know you couldn’t, that’s why I like you,” Gene smiled. “You waited on me and gave up a lot to do that.”

Babe shrugged, not sure what to say in the face of such praise. “You’d have done it for me.”  
Babe didn’t know why he could say that with such confidence. They’d never talked about it before, but something inside Babe told him that Roe wouldn’t leave him.

“I don’t know if I’m that brave,” Gene said.

“Sure you are,” Babe nodded.

Gene smiled.

“Hey you two love birds, ready for dinner?” Bill stood in the doorway to the kitchen.

Babe covered his face in embarrassment, but not before he saw the color in Gere’s face darken. Dinner was slightly uncomfortable, Babe wanted Gene’s mama to like him. He had no idea how to make that happen. Outside of Bill and Frannie, Babe was on his own. He’d like what little there was of Gene’s family to like him. Frannie went into the kitchen to cut a pie. Bill followed because he probably wanted an escape as badly as Babe did. Once they are were out of the room, Gere’s mom turned to him and smiled.

“You need to loosen up, Babe,” she said. “I already like you.”

“You do?” And Babe hated that he sounded surprised.

“Of course I do.” She looked at him like Frannie did. Like his mother used too. Soft eyes, a slight tilt of her head, and a kind sweet smile. It made Babe swallow a little hard around something he didn’t want to name.

“Of course I do,” she repeated. “Because you are perfect for my boy.”


	3. Three

“You know, when Grant dragged us here, I thought we were going to see art.” Joe looked down into his glass and watched the fruit punch swirl around.

“Joe,” Web hissed, giving him that look that said he was counting to ten. It was something he’d picked up from Joe’s mother and Joe was not a fan.

“What? Look at the materials list. It’s a package of forks and a hot glue gun. My mother has those things in her kitchen; that doesn’t make her an artist.” Joe said.

Web sighed. “Give me five more minutes of at least fucking faking it that you want to be here and I’ll make it worth your while.”

Joe turned to look at Web, trying to make sure he wasn’t having him on. Deciding that he was being serious, Joe sighed. “Fine, but I’m going to go hang out with people I know.”

Joe worked his way around the room and even though he found Tab, he kept glancing over at Web. They’d come a long way since Web had turned up on his doorstep. It hadn’t been easy, but somehow they’d managed. Because they were soulmates, his mother had said more than once. Joe tried not roll his eyes when she said that. The fact that they worked hard had nothing to do with them being soulmates. It worked because they tried, not because the stars aligned. He told her that once and she got this pleased look on her face and Joe figured he’d just made it worse.

What must have been five minutes later when Web came over and said in a hushed voice, “Ok, we can go.”

“Oh thank god.” And it was as he was saying goodbye to Chris, Joe realized that they had three more years of this shit and he had to focus on the reward Web had promised or he was going to start crying. Once they were outside the building, Web dragged him around a corner in the opposite direction of their bus stop. Joe had learned by now when Web was in that kind of mood, he just went with it. It was usually worth it. They got around the corner and Web pushed him up against the wall of the building. Joe grabbed for him and pulled him into a bruising kiss, his teeth nipping at Web’s before Web opened his mouth so Joe could slide his tongue in. And then just like that, Web pulled away and Joe made a whining noise he wasn’t really proud of.

“Hey, where are you going?” Joe said, trying to pull Web back towards him.

“Nowhere you won’t like,” Web said as he started on Joe’s belt and his fly.

And that was true, Joe had never been one to turn down a hand job in a dark alley. Well, he didn’t think he would be; they hadn’t really done it before. But he figured that it was something he could get on board with. At least he thought that was what he was getting behind until Web got down on his knees.

“Jesus,” Joe swore, because there was a sight he never thought he’d see in public. Web smirked up at him as he got Joe’s dick out of his pants. Joe petted his fingers though Web’s hair as Web took the head of Joe’s dick into his mouth, his tongue teasing along the head.

And then something truly regrettable happened. In Joe’s defense, he did mean it. It just maybe wasn’t the perfect time to say it.

“Christ, I love you.”

And he figured out that it wasn’t well received because of the somewhat stricken look on Web’s face.

“Ok, wait…” Joe started, but Web was already getting up, so Joe sighed and got himself back into his pants.

“Why the fuck did you have to say that while I had your dick in my mouth?” Web said.

“Ok, so I admit that wasn’t the best time,” Joe said. It was then that he knew it he meant it because at no point did he think to take to it back.

The bus ride back to their house was the longest ride of Joe’s life. He knew Web was pissed and he was really not positive about what to do about it. When they got back, Joe was a little grateful that everyone else was either out or still at Chris’ thing. Web headed back into their bedroom and Joe followed.

“I’m not taking it back,” Joe said as he closed the door behind him and leaned against it. “I meant it.”

“Then how come that’s the first I’m hearing it?” Webster snapped.

“Well, you can be pretty persuasive,” Joe said. And ok, this wasn’t really the time for jokes. The closed off look on Web’s face made that perfectly clear. “Look, I love you all of the time. When you’re working on your homework. When you are making dinner because you don’t want me to have to cook when I get off work. When you are going along with me to stupid crap my friends make me go to. And yeah, I love you when we’re having sex, but I love you the rest of the time too.”

“You’re an idiot,” Web said.

“Yeah, but I’m your idiot,” Joe said, turning his arm so Web could see his name. “So I guess you’ll just have to make the best of it.”

Web smiled at him and reached out for him so Joe walked over to where he was sitting on the bed. He stepped between Web’s parted legs and started to rub his fingers though Web’s hair. “You’re not mad at me anymore?”

“No,” Web said, looking up Joe with those blue eyes that still made something inside of Joe twist.

“Good, because I couldn’t fuck you if you were still pissed at me.”

Web laughed. “We both know that’s not true.”

Joe shrugged. “I like to think we’ve gown.”

Web shook his head, but he was smiling. He kicked off his shoes before he slid himself back onto the bed, arranging himself so he was leaning against the headboard. Joe pulled his shirt off over his head, not even bothering to undo the buttons. When he’d discarded the garment, he noticed that Web was bothering to unbutton his shirt.

Joe kicked off his own shoes before he climbed up the bed. “Undressing takes forever the way you do it.” Joe started on the buttons at the base of the shirt while Web kept going from the top. Finally they met in the middle with Joe having done most of the work. Joe kissed his way down Web’s neck, enjoying the little breathy noises that Web made when he did so. He sucked and bit Web’s shoulder until he was pretty sure there would be a mark there to match the one on the other side from the night before. He heard and felt Web move to get the lube out of the nightstand, but Joe would not be rushed. He took Web’s right nipple into his mouth and rolled the bud over his tongue. Web hissed and his hips bucked up. Joe scraped the edge of his teeth against Web’s skin.

Web gasped. “That is so not fair.”

Joe responded by sucking the bud hard into his mouth. Web whined, his face turning red and he pushed Joe away.

“Problem?” Joe asked, grinning from ear to ear.

Web just tossed the lube beside him.

“And what do you want me to do with this?” Joe asked.

Web started undoing his pants. “If you haven’t figured that out by now, I can’t help you.”

Joe smacked Web’s thigh and filed the shudder he gave away for later use. Joe shucked his own jeans before returning his attention to Web’s naked body. He slicked up his fingers with lube and started to press his fingers against Web’s hole. One of Web’s feet slid up the bed to give him better leverage to push into Joe’s hand. It was then that Joe worked in a finger and then a second when Web continued to arch up to meet him. After some careful stretching, he added a third.

“Fuck, Joe,” Web said.

“Always so impatient,” Joe scolded and he stretched his fingers apart, deliberately dragging one across Web’s prostate.

Web whined in response. “Come on, Lieb.”

Joe smiled. There it was. It took a little work to reduce Web to pet names, but it was always worth it as far as Joe was concerned. Joe pulled his fingers out and shucked his boxers before he slicked up his dick.

“Come on what?” Joe asked, leaning over Web.

“Fuck me,” Web stuttered over the curse word. He didn’t curse very often, but Joe was slowly starting to drag those words into his vocabulary. Joe lined himself up and he tried to go slow, giving Web time to adjust, but one of Web’s legs wrapped around him and forced him forward.

“Ahh fuck,” he swore. But the hissed yes from Web ment he didn’t slow down. The rhythm had the bed moving, the frame rocking towards the wall.

“Ahh Lieb.” Web gripped Joe’s shoulders, arching up into Joe as he thrust into Web.

The bed groaned in protest and it smacked against the wall. Web finally came with Joe’s hand on his dick and the other one gripping the headboard. As his muscles clenched around Joe, his thrusts shuddered. After that a few more thrusts, Joe came inside Web. They ended up rolled over onto their sides, lying there, looking at each other while panting for breath.

“I love you,” Web whispered.

Joe smiled. “I love you too.”

Their relationship worked. Not because they were soulmates, but because they worked at it.

*~*

“I thought she’d never leave,” Gene said, leaning back against the door of their apartment. Their apartment. That still tripped Babe up a bit. Of course, it had only been theirs for about six hours. He’d been living in Louisiana for about a week. He’d spent it looking for a place close to Gene’s school and finally they’d found a one bedroom that met their needs.

“Hey, don’t talk about your mom that way,” Babe said.

Gene rolled his eyes. “You know I love her, but she’s been here since this morning. And I’m not really sure if she didn’t notice or just refused to take the hint that I wanted you alone.”

Babe smiled and leaned forward, bracing his hand against the door and effectively pinning Gene against the door. “Well what are you going to do with me now that you have me alone?”

Gene smiled, leaned in, and kissed him. His fingers fisted in the front of Babe’s t-shirt. Babe lowered his hands so that they were gripping Gene’s hips. Babe pushed forward so there wasn’t any room between the two of them, nor between Gene and the door. Gene’s other arm came up to wrap around Babe’s neck, his fingers playing in Babe’s hair. Babe gripped the backs of Gene’s thighs and hoisted him upwards using the door to help support him.

“Hey,” Gene panted, breaking the kiss. “Do you think you could hold me up while we…” Gene trailed off, leaving Babe to imagine where he was going with the rest of that sentence. Babe was pretty sure he got the jest of it.

“I don’t know, maybe?” Babe thought honesty was probably the best policy when your soulmate was suggesting wall sex.

“Ok, let me down.” Gene patted Babe’s arm.

Babe did as instructed and Gene shuffled around him and started down the hallway.

“Hey, where are you going?” Babe asked.

“Lube,” Gene replied as if it were the most obvious thing in the world and yeah, he was probably right. “Which one of these boxes is it in?”

“It’s in the box with our bedsheets. I stuffed it at the bottom,” Babe said. He’d figured if Gene’s mom had felt helpful, she’d have probably stopped after getting one set of their sheets and making the bed. That would be enough time to stash the rest of the box. He heard tape ripping.

Babe walked out into the living room and found Gene rummaging around in their sheets. He was about to offer to help when he heard Gene make a triumphant noise.

“Found it,” Gene smiled, holding up the lube for Babe to see.

“So I see,” Babe said, crowding on Gene again.

“Nope, none of that,” Gene said. “Back into the hallway.”

“There’s a wall right here,” Babe argued.

“Humor me,” Gene said, grabbing Babe’s wrist and leading him out into the hallway.

“I’m not going to even try and pretend I know what’s going on here,” Babe said as he was lead back to where they were.

“I start school on Tuesday,” Gene said like that cleared everything up.

“And?”

Gene blushed and Babe kissed his cheek.

“I’m trying to check the hallway off the list,” Gene replied.

It took Babe a second and he almost asked Gene what he was talking about and then it dawned on him.

“So what’s next, the couch in the living room?”

“Sure.” Gene pulled Babe forward by his t-shirt again so he could kiss him. Babe pushed his hands under Gene’s t-shirt, fingers pressed into the line of Gene’s spine. Gene let go of Babe’s shirt in favor of getting his own shirt off. Once Gene had tossed the shirt on the floor, Babe set himself on Gene’s neck. He licked along the line of Gene’s collarbone before he nipped slightly at the skin there.

“Ah, Babe,” Gene gasped. He was still pulling at the front of Babe’s t-shirt. Babe decided to help him out. Babe pulled back far enough that he could get his t-shirt off. He tossed it behind him; he’d aimed it for the same direction as Gene’s, but without looking he couldn’t be sure he made it. Babe was too focused on the feeling of Gene’s fingers pressing into his biceps and the way he sucked on Babe’s bottom lip. Babe reached for Gene’s thighs again.

“Got to...” Gene gasped as Babe sucked hard on his collarbone. “Got to get my pants off first.”

“Oh yeah,” Babe said as he moved his hands to the fly of Gene’s pants.

“Unless you’ve got a plan on how to get ‘em off once I’ve got my legs around your waist?” Gene bit his lip as he watched Babe pop the button on his jeans and start on the zipper.

“I’m just doing what I’m told,” Babe said as Gene’s pants dropped to the floor.

“Well, then you probably need to take yours off too.” Gene’s cheeks were colored slightly pink.

“Think so,” Babe said as he set about shucking his own jeans.

“I’m making this up as I go,” Gene confessed.

“It’s going pretty good so far,” Babe said as he dropped both his jeans and boxers to the tile floor of the hallway before he kicked them away.

“Now if we can just keep from falling and breaking our necks.” Gene pulled of his boxers down and shoved them away with his foot.

“You have like no faith in us,” Babe said, lifting Gene’s left leg so that Gene could start stretching himself open.

Gene exhaled a gasp, his lips parting and Babe just had to kiss him, so he did. He kissed Gene as he held his hip in one hand and his thigh in the other. Gene’s hips snapped forward as he worked in his fingers and his other hand came up to clutch at Babe’s bicep, the blunt edge of his nail biting against the skin.

“So fucking hot,” Babe breathed across Gene’s ear before he licked the shell.

“Uh, Babe,” Gene grunted as Babe nipped at Gene’s earlobe.

Babe smiled before he sucked on the skin right behind Gene’s ear. Gene whined, just like Babe knew he would.

“Ahh shit,” Gene swore. “Your turn.”

Babe let out a rather embarrassing whimper when Gene’s lube slick fingers started to stroke his dick.

“Ok, last chance to bail and go for it on the tile,” Gene said.

“Oh fuck that.” Babe pushed Gene back until his back was against the door again. This time with a little more finesse, Babe picked Gene up while keeping his back pressed against the door. Gene guided Babe inside and his back thumped against the door as Babe slid inside him.

“Are you ok?” Babe’s breath came in pants across Gene’s skin.

“Ahh, give me a minute.” Gene’s fingers gripped Babe’s shoulder as he caught his breath.  
After what felt like forever but was probably only a couple of minutes, Gene tried to rock his hips down into Babe’s without a lot of success.

“How about you just lean back and let me do all the work,” Babe said.

Gene’s snicker turned into a gasp as Babe thrust up into him. The door rattled behind them with each of Babe’s thrusts and there was no way Gene couldn’t be heard moaning from the hallway. Babe couldn’t think of a better way to announce their arrival to their neighbors. ‘Yeah I just moved in with my soulmate. He makes me crazy so I’m going to have sex with him as often as his course load allows.’

“Harder,” Gene moaned before his teeth sunk into the skin of Babe’s shoulder.

As Babe picked up his pace, Gene started to stroke himself off. And that’s how he came, hand on his dick, mouthing the skin of Babe’s shoulder. His come ended up sprayed across Babe’s chest. After that it only took a few more quick sharp thrusts for Babe to come inside of Gene. They stood there for a moment until their breathing evened out before Babe set about untangling their legs and returning Gene’s feet to the floor.

“So now we unpack for bit ‘til we get our second wind?” Babe asked.

Gene nodded. “Give us time to work out what we are gonna do on that couch.”

“Then there’s the kitchen; do you think that table will hold us?”

Gene shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“You are going into construction,” Babe teased.

“On Tuesday,” Gene countered. “And until then, your guess is as good as mine.”

“We can risk it,” Babe reasoned. It came from a garage sale, it could be replaced cheaply enough. “And then there’s the bathroom. Which is good because I could use a shower, and of course, the bedroom.”

“And the laundry room,” Gene finished.

“I almost forgot the laundry room. That dryer probably has potential.”

Gene’s smile was wide and made his eyes shine, and Babe kissed him because he could.

“We have to unpack.” Gene pushed Babe back after only a few kisses.

“Hey, I was enjoying that,” Babe said as he tried to pull Gene back in.

“There will be more time for that later,” Gene replied.

And he was right. There would be plenty of time forever they wanted to do. They had each other and in their future, there would be time for whatever they wanted.

*~*

Luz was probably going to throw something. Or scream. Both seemed like a good idea. Any day that started with the air conditioning dying is never going to end well. His afternoon had been consumed by a fight with IT over whether a problem was on the software or the hardware end. It was software, not that anybody had agreed with him, but it was software. If he had to spend the rest of the week proving it to them, he would, but it was software. And he had to do the whole day babysitting his new trainee, Patrick O'Keefe. He was a good kid and he meant well, but Luz may have to kill him. It wasn’t personal, this was just not the week to make Luz train someone.

He pulled into the parking space outside their apartment. They had started living together when Luz was finishing up his degree. Frank got a job at the post office, they even gave him his own route. Luz found a job. And they collectively ignored their mothers when they inquired about when they might get married. Luz didn’t think they needed to. They were living together. They were soulmates. Why did there need to be more than that? 

When he got in the door, he kicked off his boots inside and no sooner had he gotten them off when he heard Frank call from inside the house. “Your mom called today.”

“Jesus Frank, I just got in the door,” Luz groaned. Luz walked into the living room as he unbuttoned his blue work shirt. “Let me take a shower.”

Frank was laying on the sofa watching something old and in black and white that Luz didn’t recognize. “Come here first.” Frank gestured to the sofa.

“Frank, the AC went out today and I’m pretty sure I smell,” Luz whined as he pulled off his work shirt, leaving him in a white t-shirt.

“Well, come here anyway,” Frank said.

Luz groaned and made a show of pretending to be put out. Still he went over and laid down on top of Frank and ended with his head pillowed against Frank’s sternum. He laid there, tracing his fingers along Frank’s side over the thin cotton of his t-shirt. Frank’s fingers combed through Luz’s hair. This was one of Luz’s favorite things to do. The closeness to his soulmate. It was intimate without being sexual and Luz was constantly impressed with the care with which Frank walked that line. How careful he was not to push Luz out of his comfort zone.  
“That feels good,” Luz replied, and if he leaned into Frank’s hands then he trusted Frank not to make a big deal about it.

Frank made a humming noise as he continued. They normally ended up cuddled up on their sofa. They’d watch a movie. Sometimes like this with Luz trying to decompress after a long day. Luz would often end up taking a pre-dinner nap. Other nights, especially after Thanksgiving, it was Luz trying to help Frank get the kinks out of his back from hauling packages all day. Frank, sitting on the floor in front of sofa with Luz working his fingers over Frank’s shoulders. Those days they lived on meals out of their slow cooker, Luz trying to get everything ready before he went to work. Frank would come home cold to the bone and Luz would be waiting with tea and dinner ready. They lay there for a little while, so long that Luz was starting to doze. Until he felt something land on his back.

“Frank, your cat is on my back,” Luz murmured into Frank’s side.

“Yeah, she’s just my cat,” Frank said. “That’s why I named a gray cat Penny.”

Luz smiled. Ok, so she might be their cat, but her nails were sharp and they were currently kneading Luz’s back. Luz moved his shoulders around and eventually she took the hint and jumped up to the back of the sofa. Penny had come with the apartment. One day she showed up on the patio and just refused to leave. It was cold, she had pretty yellow eyes, and they’d folded like cheap lawn chairs. 

“So what did mom want?” Luz asked.

“Well, you haven’t called her in a week,” Frank said like that should have occurred to Luz.

“I’ve been busy,” Luz countered.

“Yeah, babysitting that O'Brian kid.”

“O'Keefe,” Luz corrected out of habit.

“And I give two shits about what his name is,” Frank said. “Kid’s going to come in, do a year of training, then leave you high and dry just like the last one.”

“Yeah, but if you keep doing that, I’m going to end up calling him that,” Luz said.

“Poor baby,” Frank muttered.

Luz smiled against Frank’s chest.

“Lip invited us out for the fourth,” Luz said. “I told him I’d have to ask you. I don’t know that I want to share you since you’ve managed to get two days off in one week.”

“Kitty called and you know how it is; she has you agreeing to stuff before you know what’s happening,” Frank said.

“She talk you into bringing something?” Luz asked.

“Of course,” Frank said.

The oven beeped in the kitchen. And Frank patted his side. “Get up, that’s dinner.”

Luz goaned but he did as he was told. “What’s for dinner?”

“I made a lasagna,” Frank said.

“Oh, check out my domestic goddess,” Luz said as they walked towards the kitchen.

“Shut up,” Frank mumbled as he got plates out of the cabinet.

Luz smiled as he took them. “You know I love you, right?”

Frank smiled. “I know you do, I love you too. Now move, I’m going to be pissed if my lasagna burns because you had to get mushy on me.”

Luz did as he was told and he couldn’t stop smiling. He knew in the start that he hadn’t put much stock in the forces that chose the soulmates. But he was glad his mother did. He’s glad Lip did. Because without their pushing him, he might not have made it this far. And he wouldn’t want to miss this for the world.

*~*

“So did your parents freak out about the boy’s name too?” If asked why he wanted know, Hoosier couldn’t have told you, but he did.

Leckie shook his head. “They don’t care that much.”

Hoosier didn’t know what to make of the look on Leckie’s face or the casual way he brushed off his parents’ indifference.

“So are you going to give me tour?” Leckie asked, changing the subject before taking another drink of his beer.

“You can see most of it from here.” Hoosier glanced around the room. His parents weren’t dramatically wealthy, but they weren’t poor either. So the house was small. They’d never needed much room; it was just the three of them after all.

“Really? Because it seems like there’s something up those stairs,” Leckie said, leaning out the doorway into the hallway so he could see up the stairs.

“It’s just my parent’s room and what’s left of my old room.” Hoosier replied.

“Then it shouldn’t take too long,” Leckie smiled.

Hoosier grumbled, but he got up off the sofa and headed to the stairs. “Fine.”

“That’s the very reluctant spirit,” Leckie said, patting Hoosier shoulder as they climbed the stairs. Hoosier rolled his eyes. At the top of the stairs at the right, Hoosier turned into his room. He clicked on the light switch and walked in. There really wasn’t much left. His dressers were both gone, along with the desk that had been sitting in the corner. He had a couple of posters of cars that were still on the walls. There was also still an Indiana University poster on the wall. His bed was pushed into the corner. He’d left it; it was double. He’d found a queen at a sale. The closet doors were open, hangers were left on the bar. The walls were still the same pale blue his mother had painted them when they moved in.

“See? Not much.” Hoosier flopped down on the bed. His mother kept it made, in case they had guests. There would have been more blankets piled up on it if Hoosier had still been living there.

“Still an Indiana fan?” Leckie asked, looking at the old poster that Hoosier had brought with him when they moved.

“And my friends call me Hoosier.”

“Do they?” Leckie mused as he walked around the rest of the room. He sat his backpack at the end of the bed. He stuck his head into the closet before he turned and walked towards the bed. “Well, I think you’ll do.” Leckie sat down on the bed.

“Do you?” Hoosier asked. He sat up a bit so that he was on Leckie’s level. They stared at each other for a moment before Hoosier decided fuck it. He grabbed the front of Leckie’s shirt and pulled him into a kiss. Leckie’s lips didn’t move at first, but when Hoosier’s tongue slid along his bottom lip, it was like something snapped. Leckie’s lips parted and his arms came up around Hoosier neck, pulling him closer. Leckie bit the inside of Hoosier’s lip and Hoosier wrapped his arms around Leckie’s waist, trying to pull him closer even though he knew he couldn’t. Leckie’s fingers were in his hair when he pulled back for a breath. Leckie whined a little at the loss of contact and made to pull Hoosier back in.

“Wait, are we doing this?” Hoosier asked.

“Fuck yes,” Leckie said, pulling him back to kiss.

It shouldn’t be thrilling to being having sex in his old room, in his parents’ house. His parents were out town, they weren’t coming back early. But there was something about it that made Hoosier hot. Made him almost tear Leckie’s shirt in his haste to get it off. He was not the only one though, Leckie practically attacked Hoosier’s jeans. Hoosier pulled his own t-shirt off over his head and tossed it behind him. He ran his hands down Leckie’s ribs and pulled him up to meet him again as he started kissing Leckie’s neck. He felt Leckie shiver in response when he gasped as he felt Luckie cup him though his boxers. Hoosier opened Leckie’s belt and pulled it through so fast it made a snapping noise. The shoes clanked loudly when they hit the floor.

“I have lube in my backpack,” Leckie said as he tried to get Hoosier’s pants off.

“Fuck,” Hoosier hissed. He moved back and Leckie seemed to take this as approval. Leckie reached over the footboard and he bit his lip as he rummaged around in the bag. His eyebrows raised and he sat back up with the lube in his hand.

“You have any idea what you’re doing with that?” Hoosier asked, as he pulled his jeans the rest of the way off. He knew how this worked in theory, but he didn’t have any actual practice.

“I’ve done it with my own fingers enough that I got it covered,” Leckie said as he shimmied out of his pants.

“Fuck.” Hoosier slid back on the bed and felt the headboard against his back.

“Yeah,” Leckie nodded as he straddled Hoosier’s lap. “Yeah, you want to do that?” Leckie rolled his hips down so his boxer-covered ass ground over Hoosier’s dick.

“Shit yes,” Hoosier whispered as his hips snapped up against Leckie’s ass. He kissed Leckie, tongue dragging along his molars before their tongues started to duel.

“Fuck, I have to get my boxers off,” Leckie said as he tried to wiggle out of Hoosier’s hold on his hips. Hoosier was a little embarrassed at how tight he had been holding on. Leckie finally got his boxers off by rolling over onto his side next to Hoosier. Once they were off, Leckie repositioned himself in Hoosier’s lap. 

Leckie squeezed lube out onto his fingers and dragged his bottom lip over his teeth as he reached behind himself.

“Fuck, so hot,” Hoosier said as he nuzzled Leckie’s nose.

“Really?” Leckie questioned as he bucked forward; his dick sliding against Hoosier abs. Hoosier nodded and after that they lost track of their goal. A frantic edge caught them as Leckie rocked into Hoosier again and Hoosier’s cloth cover dick slid along the crack of Leckie’s ass. Hoosier swore and Leckie gasped. So they didn’t make it to the main event. Leckie covered Hoosier’s chest with his come, and Hoosier was somewhat mortified that he came in his boxers.

“Shit,” Leckie panted as he removed his slick finger from his ass.

Hoosier groaned as he worked to get his boxers off. Leckie moved so he could accomplish his task. “We’re staying here tonight,” Hoosier said.

Leckie nodded as Hoosier pulled him down so they were both laying down on the bed.

“Promise me something?” Leckie asked.

“What?” Hoosier asked, knowing it couldn’t be too serious because Leckie’s grin was back.

“That you’ll still respect me in the morning.”

Hoosier laughed and he felt lighter. And as his fingers traced along Leckie’s spine, he no longer minded catching sight of Leckie’s name on his skin.

*~*

“Wake up.”

Walt shifted away from the finger poking him in the shoulder. “No.”

“Wake up.” The finger was more insistent now and Ray’s voice had the edge of a whine to it.

Walt groaned. “This is my one day off this week. Go bother Nate.”

“Yeah well, I’m pretty sure Brad would kill me if I did the things to Nate that I want to do you,” Ray replied.

Walt rolled over and looked at Ray. “You woke me up for sex?”

“Yes!” Ray grinned broadly.

“No,” Walt said, rolling back over and pulling the covers up around him.

“Walt!” Ray stretched out Walt’s name so that it possessed at least eight vowels. Maybe not all of them As.

“You’re going to have to do ninety percent of the work.” Walt rolled onto his back.

“Sold,” Ray said, practically launching himself across Walt to get to the nightstand.

“Jesus, watch the knees,” Walt said, moving to avoid Ray’s failing limbs. “If you wack me in the balls, this going to be over real quick.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Ray said, taking a little more care as he climbed back over Walt with lube in his hand.

“Come here,” Walt said, guiding Ray down to kiss him. Walt liked kissing Ray. He liked the way Ray seemed hell bent on mapping every inch of his mouth with his tongue.

“Is that coming out of your ten percent?” Ray asked, a smile tugged at his lips.

Walt smiled. “No, but the undressing might.”

“Well then allow me,” Ray said, grabbing the hem of Walt’s shirt and tugged it upward. Walt raised his arms above his head as Ray pulled his shirt off and tossed it somewhere behind him. Ray pulled his shirt off over his head and discarded it in the same direction. Ray started kissing Walt’s neck, wet open-mouthed kisses, but once he passed Walt’s collarbone Walt started trying to pull him back upwards. Maybe it was faulty wiring, but for whatever reason Walt did not get off on having his nipples played with. This did not stop Ray from trying, he’d kind of turned it into a mission. Walt just found it annoying. But he finally got Ray back up to kiss him, cradling Ray’s head in his hand.

“How do you want to do this?” Ray asked.

“You’re doing all the work,” Walt said, wrapping one of his legs around Ray’s waist and pulling him forward so their erections rubbed together even though they were still separated by their boxers. A hiss of air passed through Ray’s teeth as he did this. Ray didn’t top very often. It wasn’t that Walt had a preference. He liked Ray naked; he didn’t give it much thought after that. Ray usually ended up pulling Walt on top of him and so Walt went where Ray put him. It might have something to do with the praise kink that Ray had going on. That Walt had to admit he shamelessly encouraged.

“Fuck, ok,” Ray panted as his hips continued to rock forward.

“You should probably take our boxers off,” Walt supplied helpfully.

“So helpful, you,” Ray said and he worked to get his own boxers off. He grinned at Walt as he started to pull Walt’s boxers off very slowly.

“Such a fucking tease,” Walt said as he lifted his hips in invitation.

“Me?” Ray asked as he tossed Walt’s boxers over his left shoulder.

“You’re enjoying this too much,” Walt replied.

“You’ll enjoy it in a minute,” Ray promised as he started slicking up his fingers.

To accompany Ray’s probing fingers, Ray took the tip of Walt’s dick into his mouth. His tongue played along the head as Ray pressed a finger into Walt.

“Shit, Ray. So good,” Walt swore, his hand sliding over Ray’s close cropped hair.

Ray hummed around Walt’s dick and slowly traced a second finger around Walt’s entrance before he pressed it in alongside the other finger. Ray traced the veins on the under of Walt’s cock and it was everything Walt could do not to thrust his hips up into Ray’s mouth. Ray took Walt into the back of his throat as he added a third finger.

Walt gasped, “Ray, stop, going to…”

“Problem?” Ray asked, pulling off Walt’s dick with a pop.

Walt leaned up to get closer to Ray, his blunt nails pressing along the skin of Ray’s scalp. “You’re too good at that.”

Walt nuzzled his nose along Ray’s and the moment was in danger of becoming tender when Ray pressed one of his fingers into Walt’s prostate. “Jesus,” Walt moaned.

“Ready?” Ray asked, twisting his fingers so that he hit Walt’s prostate again.

“Yes.” Walt rocked his hips down into Ray’s hand.

Ray removed his fingers and proceeded to coat his dick in lube before lining himself up and carefully sliding into Walt. When he didn’t start moving right away, Walt tipped his head to one side. “You ok, baby?” Walt rubbed his hand along Ray’s ribcage.

“Need a second,” Ray whispered, his eyes screwed shut.

Walt nuzzled his nose against Ray’s. “Shit, you feel good. You gonna screw me nice hard?”

“Fuck.” Ray’s hips rocked forward.

“That’s spirit,” Walt said as he rocked his hips up into Ray’s.

Ray surged forward to kiss him and as their lips locked, Ray picked up the speed of his thrusts. Walt met every one, pressing his hips up into Ray’s. They swallowed each other’s moans, their tongues sliding along each other, and when Walt tightened his muscles around Ray, Ray bit Walt’s lip.

“Faster,” Walt hissed against Ray’s lips.

Ray fingers tightened their hold on Walt’s hips and they lost themselves in the rhythm of frantic thrusting and panting against each other’s lips. Walt came with Ray’s hand around his dick, and Ray followed a few desperate thrusts later.

“Glad I woke you up for that?” Ray asked from where he collapsed against Walt’s chest.

Walt was going to attempt a joke, but there was something in the way that Ray was looking at him that made him stop. “Course I am, you’re always so good.”

Ray preened under the praise, just like he always did. Walt didn’t know what it was that brought this insecurity out in Ray, but he was always going to try to put it right.

“Good boy,” Walt said, his fingers still sliding against Ray’s scalp.

Ray purred against Walt’s chest. Walt smiled. It was easy to love Ray. From the second he’d bounded off the plane and hugged Walt in the middle of the airport, it had been really easy to love to Ray.

*~*

Ron gripped the steering wheel tighter as he drove and turned the Led Zeppelin up. This had sounded like a good idea at the time. When they’d planned this on the phone, it had sounded like a good idea. They’d meet halfway and that had the benefit of it being just them. There would be no Kitty prying and no Luz trying to embarrass the crap out Lip and succeeding. So it had sounded like a great idea. Now, while driving down there, the flaws in the plan were starting to become more visible. Because in just a few minutes it was going to be him, Lip, and an empty hotel room. And that combination came with some expectations that Ron hadn’t really given much thought to. Until he watched Kitty thinking she was being sneaky and stuffing lube and condoms into his overnight bag. So maybe he’d given it a little bit of thought in the drugstore, but he’d reasoned that there would be drugstores there.

But as he pulled into the hotel parking lot, it started to feel more real. When he got into the lobby, Lip wasn’t there so he checked in. After that he found a chair, sat down, and pretended to look at his phone while he looked up whenever someone entered the room. Even though they had skyped, that hadn’t been enough to trigger whatever mystical force gave you color vision. Ron had figured if that were a loophole it would probably be all over the internet, but he’d still been a little disappointed. Finally, behind a family of six, in walked Lip and then there was color. As Ron walked over to Lip, Lip turned and Ron could tell by the blinking that it started happening to him too.

“Hey,” he said when he reached Lip. It was awkward. Ron wasn’t quite sure how to greet Lip. He was not a hugger no matter how hard Kitty tried. A handshake seemed weird and the idea of kissing Lip in the lobby was not one that appealed to Ron. It wasn’t the act that he was protesting, but rather the location.

“Hi,” Lip said and that was the first time Ron has seen a blush in color. It was even more endearing.

“Do you want to head to the room, then we could go get dinner?” Lip asked.

“Sure,” Ron shrugged.

Honestly, that was what Ron was going to do. He really was intending to walk up there with Lip, drop their bags, and head out for dinner. Really, that was all. And he’d almost made it too. They were standing in the small little hallway by the door of their hotel room.

Lip turned to him. “Where do you-”

Lip was probably going ask him where he wanted to go and Ron just wanted to kiss him, so he did. He put his hand on the back of Lip’s neck and guided him forward. Then nothing, Lip just froze. So Ron pulled away.

“Shit,” Lip swore. “I screwed that up. Can we try that again?”

Ron smiled and leaned in and this time when their lips met, he felt Lip’s lips move under his. Ron traced his bottom lip with his tongue. Lip’s mouth opened and as their tongues slid against each other, Ron started guiding Lip back toward the bed.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” Lip said, breaking the kiss.

“You’re doing pretty good so far,” Ron countered.

“But…”

Ron kissed him again and started unbuttoning Lip’s shirt as he went. “You worry too much, you’ll be fine.”

Lip swallowed and watched as Ron finished unbuttoning his shirt. “You got dressed up for me?” Ron said, taking in the button down shirt and khaki pants. Ron hadn’t put a whole lot of effort into getting ready. He’d just pulled on jeans and a t-shirt of a local band. He was driving all day, and it was Lip. This was the one person he shouldn’t have to try around.

Lip blushed. “All that hard work and you’re already taking it off.”

“Disappointed?” Ron asked and he pulled Lip’s shirt off his shoulders.

“No,” Lip said, struggling a bit to pull Ron in for a kiss with his shirt rucked down around his elbows, but he managed.

After that clothes went flying everywhere. Carwood’s shirt landed at the foot of the bed on top of his shoes. Ron’s shoes ended up under the bed. His jeans tossed carelessly at a chair in the corner. His t-shirt skidded across the nightstand before landing on the floor. His boxers were kicked off toward the end of the bed. Lip’s undershirt was halfway to the closet on the floor; his khakis were balanced precariously on the television.

His boxers were still on though and Ron had to admit that he was probably enjoying that more than he should. Since he was currently stroking Lip through them.

“I hate you so much right now,” Lip hissed, but his hips rocked up into Ron’s hand anyway.

“It really doesn’t feel that way,” Ron replied, but he took mercy on him and started pulling down Lip’s boxers. As he did, he leaned forward so he was kneeling almost at the end of the bed so that Lip could feel his breath across his dick. Ron received a hiss of breath in response. Ron tossed Lip’s boxers over his shoulder. His hands come to rest on Lip’s hips and he pressed them firmly into the mattress. He leaned forward and licked Lip’s dick from base to the head.

“Fuck,” Lip swore, his head tipping back into the pillow.

Ron smiled before he licked around the base of the head. Above him, Lip gasped. Ron took the head of Lip’s dick into his mouth and sucked. Lip’s fingers fisted in the bedspread beneath him. Parting his lips, Ron let Lip’s dick slid over his tongue, using his fingers to tease Lip’s balls.

“Christ,” Lip whined.

To be able to watch Lip come undone because of him gave Ron a smug feeling that he was sure he wouldn’t feel again. The image of Lip’s back arched slightly, fingers white knuckled and gripping the bed sheets as he came down his throat, was going to be burned into his brain. He pulled back, grinning as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Fuck,” Lip gasped.

“Maybe later,” Ron replied.

“Jesus,” Lip swore before he pulled Ron up. Their lips locked again as Lip started stroking Ron’s dick. Ron rocked his hips up to meet Lip’s hand.

“Fuck,” Ron hissed as his nose dragged along Lip’s, his bangs falling across his forehead.

“Later,” Lip said and that one word combined with a slight twist of Lip’s wrist had Ron coming across his chest. Ron ended up collapsing on Lip. As his breathing returned to normal, Ron’s fingers glided along Lip’s ribs.

“So later?” Ron asked.

Ron could feel Lip’s laughter in his chest. “You’re so going to have to buy me dinner first.”

“We’ll find somewhere that delivers, because I have strong objections to getting out of this bed,” Ron said.

“And what would those be?” Lip asked.

“Well you’re in it, for one,” Ron replied.

They always tell you that your life will change the minute your soulmate’s name appeared on your arm. Ron knew that wasn’t true, at least not for him. The day that Carwood Lipton appeared on his arm was a day like any other. Today on the other hand, today was life changing.

*~*

In the middle of lunch, Lew had elbowed Dick in the ribs and when he’d turned to give Lew his attention, he noticed that his name was starting to appear on Lew’s arm. It was just the faintest of outline, but it made Dick smile all the same. Sure, he knew it was going to be there; today was Lew’s birthday after all. But knowing it and seeing it are two very different things.

When they got home that afternoon, Dick’s mother greeted them at the door, demanding to see Lew’s arm. Dick watched as his mother ran her fingers over his name.

“Oh, look at me being silly,” she said, wiping a stray tear off her face. “We have presents to open.”

Dick’s mom had made Nix’s favorite chicken parmesan. She also bought a cake with too much icing for Dick’s taste that said “Happy 16th Birthday Lewis.”

“That was the most normal birthday I’ve ever had,” Lew said, sitting on the edge of Dick’s bed. There were two beds in Dick’s room, two twins. There had been since a week before Dick’s sixteenth birthday. Dick though the second bed was a waste of space and waste of money. No one had ever slept in it. He figured his parents had to know that, but if they weren’t going to mention it, neither was he.

“It will probably be just like that next year so I’m glad you enjoyed it,” Dick said.

Lew smiled before he climbed into bed. He slid all the way over, back pressed against the wall. Dick crawled in after him. They were lying there in bed practically nose to nose. Dick brought his fingers up to trace over the letters of his name on Lew’s arm.

“It’s not going anywhere,” Lew said. “Everyone keeps touching it like it might rub it off.”

Dick knew he blushed slightly at being caught and he did feel a little silly. He’d joined Anne in teasing his mother. But now that they were alone, it felt different now, it felt so much more real.

“Hey, you’re starting to give me a complex. My eyes are up here,” Lew said.

“I know,” Dick said, leaning up and pressing a quick kiss to Lew’s lips.

Lew made a disappointed noise. “Ah none of that. It’s my birthday, I get real kisses.”

Lew grabbed for him to pull him closer, not that that was really possible. There was only so much room on this bed; Dick couldn’t get far. He was kissing Lew before he even got a chance to register what happened. Lew was crafty that way. Their lips slid together in a familiar way. After all, they’d been sneaking kisses since they were fourteen. Dick’s hands found their way under Lew’s shirt, pressing against his ribcage and sliding along his spine. Lew made a frustrated noise against Dick’s mouth before moving away to pull his shirt over his head. Lew didn’t even miss a beat before he dove back into kiss Dick. He rolled them so he was on top of Dick. Dick’s fingers drifted up to run though Lew’s hair, stroking through the locks that Lew kept longer, before settling at the base of Lew’s neck so he could keep him closer. As if Lew was going to go anywhere.

Lew made a frustrated noise before he hissed, “take your fucking shirt off,” against Dick’s lips.

It wasn’t exactly easy considering that Lew didn’t give him a whole lot of room to work with, but Dick managed it.

“Mine,” Lew said, running his fingers over Dick’s chest.

“It’s been yours for a while now,” Dick replied.

Lew nodded, but he was still watching his fingers move over Dick’s chest. Like he was trying to memorize every inch of him, even though he’d had plenty of experience with the terrain.

“I know your parents are down the hall, but…” Nix trailed off.

They didn’t like to push their luck. Normally they’d wait until they were gone to one of Anne’s volleyball tournaments, clear out the house before they tried to fool around. But tonight it seemed worth the risk.

“We have to be quiet,” Dick said.

Lew nodded. “Yeah, quiet. Got it.” Lew’s fingers had already dipped into Dick’s boxers, tracing over his hipbones.

With Lew precariously balanced above him, Dick managed to shimmy out of his boxers before kicking them over the side of the bed. Lew tried to duplicate this action, but gave up in favor of getting off the bed and just sliding them off so they pooled around his feet. Lew wasted no time in getting back into bed with Dick and he twisted and turned to pull the covers over the top of them. They started kissing again, their naked bodies sliding together. It was sporadic and just never quite enough. Dick spit into his hand and took both their cocks into his hand, setting a slow and measured rhythm.

Lew made a whining noise. “Faster, Dick, come on.”

Dick picked up the pace with Lew rocking his hips up to meet Dick’s. Their kiss had dissolved into the sliding of lips, teeth dragging over lips, no skill involved. As Dick twisted his wrist, Nix came over Dick’s hand while he clenched his fingers into Dick’s shoulder. Their foreheads touched, the pants of Lew’s breath dancing across his face.

“Your turn,” Lew smiled before he leaned down and started sucking on the skin of Dick’s shoulder. Dick knew there would be a mark in the morning and he knew that’s why Lew was doing it. Once he was satisfied with the size of the hickey, Lew slid down under the covers and Dick had to push them back so he could see as Lew licked his cock from base to tip. A breath hissed through Dick’s clenched teeth as he gripped the sheets beneath him. Lew smirked before taking the head of Dick’s cock into his mouth. He sucked, tracing the head. Dick bit his lip and arched his back. He pressed the heel of his hand against Lew’s shoulder to push him back as he ended up coming on Lew’s chest.

Lew smiled as he wiped a streak of Dick’s come off his chin. Dick returned the smile as he panted for air. He bit his lip again as Lew licked Dick’s come off the heel of his hand. Dick reached over the side of the bed and retrieved his t-shirt. He leaned up and wiped his remaining come off Lew’s chest.

“I always hoped it would be you,” Lew said, looking directly into Dick’s eyes when he said it. “When we were kids, I hoped it would be you.”

“I knew it was you,” Dick smiled and pulled Lew into a kiss.

*~*  
Brad entered the house through the garage because he didn’t have house keys. There had been some concern about them not reaching Brad before he came home. And as Nate had explained, he was not wild about a set of their house keys floating around a government mailroom. So Brad had just accepted the code to the garage, mostly because Nate was starting to sound overwhelmed. It had all started when Brad’s parents had decided to retire to Washington State. The obvious question had followed of what to do with Brad’s stuff? This question was exasperated by the fact that he was out of the country. So his boxes had been moved in with Nate. A month later, those boxes and Nate moved into a house because Nate was tired of tripping over Brad’s ‘crap’.

Their house, and Brad still stumbled over that phrase, wasn’t terribly impressive. It was a small two bedroom, one bathroom house. The rest of the house was a kitchen and a living room which Nate had turned half of into a dining room by adding a table and four chairs. This table was currently buried under the scattered remains of Nate’s school work. In the second bedroom, Brad found his ‘crap’ still in boxes, clearly labeled by Nate or his mother. Brad started by cutting the tape on the first box and peeling back the tape.

“I really was going to have those unpacked by the time that you got back.” Nate was standing there in the doorway, messenger bag slung over his shoulder.

“Finish the thesis?” Brad asked.

“I have to meet with my adviser Monday morning to discuss it,” Nate replied. “Do you need any help?”

Brad shook his head.

“Well, I’m going to clear off dining room table,” Nate said, nodding his head towards the living room.

“There’s a table in there?” Brads asked.

“You’re really not as funny as you think you are,” Nate said, but he was smiling when he left the doorway.

Brad was returning his attention to the room full of boxes when he heard a loud crash from the living room. He stuck his head out into the room to watch as Nate tossed another book in a large cardboard next to the table.

“Feel better?” Brad asked.

Nate smiled. “Ray suggested that I just haul it all out to the beach and we could burn it in a fire pit.”

“And you augured in favor of the environment?” Brad asked.

“No, I told him Saturday after I argue it, I’m up for it.” Nate slid the box over to the edge of the table and raked a stack of papers off into the box.

Brad couldn’t help the small smile that formed on his lips while he watched Nate dump the drafts and notes into a box. He’d followed Nate’s thesis from a distance, in emails and letters. He knew it was a source of anxiety for Nate. Not so much because Nate had mentioned it, but because everyone else had. Even Ray had sent him an email informing him that he needed to be nice to his boyfriend. And for the first time, it hadn’t occurred to Brad to correct him. To snap back that Nate wasn’t his boyfriend. He’d just asked what the fuck Ray was going on about this time.

When Ray had pointed it out that he was no longer getting huffy about Nate being referred to as his boyfriend, Brad had paused. He wasn’t sure what it was that caused him to stop seeing that the distinction was necessary. If it had been the three years they had spent living in his parents’ house while Nate applied for grad school and Brad tried not to die of boredom while he was on leave. Or if it had been that Nate had felt the need, unprompted, to continue that communication while Brad was deployed.

Brad watched as Nate hauled the box over to the hall closet and shoved it unceremoniously inside. He closed the door a bit more firmly than necessary.

“If we could get through the weekend without mentioning that,” Nate nodded his head towards the closet, “again, this weekend that would be great.” Nate headed off to the kitchen and Brad shamelessly watched his ass as he did. There was rummaging noises in the kitchen and then Nate stuck his head back into the living room. “I bought steaks today since I figure you might want real food.” Then he paused and looked at Brad a little strangely. “Why are looking at me like that?”

Brad didn’t know how he was looking at Nate, but he did know why. Somewhere along the way, he’d figured out that if he was ever going to love another person, it was probably going to be Nate. And the first thing that Brad wanted to do with that knowledge was kiss him. So he walked across the room to where Nate was standing and pulled him into an admittedly harsh kiss. Brad had expected Nate to pull away, maybe shove him. But he didn’t. Nate’s fingers just came up to clutch at Brad’s leather jacket, pulling him forward slightly. Encouraged, Brad backed Nate up against the doorframe of the kitchen. When his back hit the wood, Nate seemed to come to his senses and pushed Brad back slightly.

“Wait. If we’re really doing this, I don’t share.” Nate met Brad’s gaze and held it.

“Good,” Brad said. “Neither do I.” Brad pushed Nate back again; this time the angle led to Nate being pressed against the kitchen counter. Nate went willingly, putting his arms around Brad’s neck and pulling him down into a kiss. When Nate hit the counter, Brad picked him up by the back of his thighs and deposited him on the counter. When his ass hit the surface, Nate’s teeth bit down on Brad’s lip. Brad hissed as Nate pulled slightly at his lip. He turned his attention to getting Nate’s shirt off. The buttons were a pain in the ass and a few of them were ripped off in the process. Once the fabric was out of the way, Brad latched onto the skin over Nate’s collarbone. Nate gasped, his hand flying to stroke through Brad’s short hair. Spurred on by the reaction, Brad kissed and nipped a bruising trail down Nate’s chest. But nothing he did compared to the reaction that Brad got when he pulled one of Nate’s nipples into his mouth and sucked. Nate’s moan cut through the silence in the kitchen as Nate’s head knocked against the cabinet behind his head.

Brad smirked at him. Before this last deployment, Brad used to relish in provoking a reaction from Nate. Nate was normally so stoic, so when Brad could piss him off, it made him feel like he had some kind of power in this. Right now though, standing in the kitchen, this was different. This time he wanted a reaction from Nate, not for his benefit, but for Nate’s. Brad resolutely tried not to think about what that meant.

“There’s no way you aren’t going to use that against me, are you?” Nate asked.

In response, Brad took Nate’s right nipple into his mouth, rolling the bud over his teeth as Brad pulled open Nate’s belt and yanked it though the belt loops. As the belt cleared the last loop, the leather smacked against Nate’s thigh.

“Shit,” he swore as he guided Brad back up so he could kiss him. As their tongues dueled inside Nate’s mouth, Brad popped the button and worked open Nate’s fly so he could get his hand wrapped around Nate’s dick, causing Nate’s fingers to tighten their hold on Brad’s shoulder. Brad broke the kiss and leaned down to take one of Nate’s nipples into his mouth; this time the left. He sucked the bud hard as he jacked Nate off.

“Oh Jesus,” Nate whined, his teeth dragging over his abused lip.

The combination proved to be too much for Nate. His hips started to snap up into Brad’s fist and when Brad bit down on Nate’s peck, he moaned and came in Brad’s hand.

Watching Nate fall apart, feeling Nate’s fingers gripping his bicep, caused feelings in Brad that he would have denied posing. He’d never really thought that he could care about someone like that. He never imagined giving any thought about how his actions made another person feel. 

“Fuck,” Nate swore. Brad watched as Nate looked at him with hooded eyes before giving him shove back in the middle of his chest. “Your turn.”

Nate smirked as Brad backed up to let him hop down off the counter. When his feet hit the floor, Nate pulled him into a kiss and started backing Brad towards the oven behind him. Nate immediately set to work on getting Brad’s jeans open before allowing them to fall to the floor.

“Christ,” Brad hissed as Nate dropped to his knees in their kitchen and started pulling down Brad’s boxers. He grinned up at Brad. Nate licked his lips and then licked the underside of Brad’s dick. Brad’s knees locked and he grabbed the oven handle for support. Nate wrapped his lips around the head of Brad’s dick and sucked. His tongue slid against the base of Brad’s dick as Nate hollowed out his cheeks and started to take Brad down his throat. Brad’s hips snapped forward on their own accord and Nate pressed them back against the oven. Nate hummed around Brad’s dick as he stroked Brad’s balls. What finally undid Brad was watching Nate blink and look up at him. Nate gagged slightly as Brad came, pulled away, and ended up with a swipe of come across his chest. Brad, still breathing heavily, slid down the oven so he was sitting on the floor.

“Fuck,” he said as he watched Nate wipe his face off with the back of his hand.

As he sat there on the floor chest heaving, he realized that Nate had probably done that before. The thought made something ugly twist in Brad’s stomach. He didn’t have any right to that feeling though. For the last six years, he’d been Nate’s soulmate in name only. He hadn’t done anything to deserve the title. He’d neglected him, ignored him, and kept him at arm’s length. It was really no wonder that Nate hadn’t wanted to wait around for Brad to get his shit together.

“I’m going to take that as a compliment,” Nate said.

Brad shook his head, as he tried to clear it. “You should.”

The motion didn’t help though. The light hearted teasing felt flat. Brad hadn’t felt this kind of possessiveness for another person in a long time. Nate somehow managed to bring out those old instincts, letting them claw their way to the surface. He’d promised he’d never let himself feel like that again because people can make the choice to be with you and they can make the choice to be with someone else.

Nate seemed to notice Brad’s internal struggle because he tipped his head to the side ever so slightly. Those damn eyes. Brad had always loathed the way they seemed to pin him, the way they were searching his face.

“Are we really doing this?” Brad asked, echoing Nate’s words from his parents’ house years before. 

Nate shook his head. “Yeah, if you want. Don’t fucking pretend you don’t know the answer on my end. If you haven’t figure it out that I want a relationship with you by now, I honestly cannot help you.” Nate’s words were sharp, but there wasn’t any emotion in his voice. All the emotion Nate had seemed to be resting in his eyes. Nate smiled at Brad as he got up off the floor.

“Come on, I need a shower, it feels weird having a serious conversation while your come dries on my chest.” Nate held out his hand for Brad to take, Brad’s name on his forearm, shining with sweat. As Brad took Nate’s hand, it was the first time that that collection of letters meant something to Brad.

**Author's Note:**

> Once again all my love goes to gilove2dance. She gave so much of her free time for this fic, and I will always love her for that.


End file.
